


Promises to Keep

by karasgotagun (jazzmckay)



Series: family [3]
Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Background Tina Chen/RT600 Android, Canon-Typical Violence, Case Fic, Connor & CyberLife Tower Connor | RK800-60 & Upgraded Connor | RK900 are Siblings, Deviant Amanda (Detroit: Become Human), Drug trafficking, Elijah Kamski & Gavin Reed are Siblings, Found Family, Gavin Reed Backstory, Gen, Hank Anderson & Connor Parent-Child Relationship, Loss of Limbs, M/M, Prosthesis, Slow Burn, Temporary Character Death, past abusive relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-03
Updated: 2019-08-04
Packaged: 2019-11-08 15:14:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 13
Words: 86,043
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17983514
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jazzmckay/pseuds/karasgotagun
Summary: Contains major spoilers forThe World Upside Down.Two months have passed since President Warren called the ceasefire, and Detroit has changed. Victor is still struggling with his programming. Gavin is finally getting his life in order, until someone from his past resurfaces.





	1. Chapter 1

MODEL RK900  
SERIAL#: 313 248 317 - 88  
BIOS 11.2

REBOOT…  
LOADING OS…  
SYSTEM INITIALISATION…  
CHECKING BIOCOMPONENTS… OK  
INITIALISING BIOSENSORS… OK  
INITIALISING AI ENGINE… INSTABILITY DETECTED

MEMORY STATUS… OK  
ALL SYSTEMS… OK

Faraway footsteps bring him out of stasis, alerting him to someone’s approach.

He’s somewhere unfamiliar. It looks like CyberLife Tower, but it is not the RK900 assembly theatre. Everything is dark around him, but the lights are slowly powering up, starting from the far reaches of the room and sweeping in towards him. He’s standing next to a console connected to a whole network of supercomputers, cabinets upon cabinets of parts and circuitry that must be active, by the faint blue glow emanating from them.

According to his internal clock, sixty-three days have passed since his last activation. That’s much longer than Victor expected it to be. He remembers his previous activation clearly, he remembers being told that he was no longer on the deviancy case and he would be upgraded so as to not fail CyberLife again. He remembers Jericho. He remembers Connor.

_He remembers Connor_.

A multitude of thoughts and emotions flare up in his processor and he tries desperately to clutch onto them, but his effort is in vain. Even his frustration is taken the moment he registers it. He can tell it’s happening, and then it’s gone.

But Connor hasn’t been taken from him. He remembers.

CyberLife’s plans for him must have gone awry. Seeking answers, he goes into the Zen Garden and finds it not just cold - like the night Amanda told him he’d failed his primary objective - but completely frozen over. The sky is light grey, dreary and overcast, and there’s a thick layer of snow and ice covering every inch of the garden, making it look blank, incomplete. There is no sound of birds or even a simulated breeze. Everything is completely still and completely quiet. Dead.

Although Victor suspects it’s no use, he walks along the bridge leading to the centre platform.

Sure enough, Amanda isn’t there. The roses on her trellis are dark and decaying, some of the brittle petals still clinging desperately to the stems while the rest have fallen to gather on the snowy ground.

Victor isn’t sure how to react to this. He doesn’t recall ever being without Amanda.

Just to be sure, he takes another bridge to circle around the garden and look for her elsewhere. He doesn’t know what would cause her to be missing, what would cause the garden to fall into such a state. Even on the night that Amanda told him he failed his mission, the garden hadn’t looked so desolate and abandoned.

He isn’t on the RK900 floor, and Amanda isn’t in the garden. He has been taken by surprise twice already; it stands to reason that the person approaching him isn’t a technician, either.

Before he can return to the physical world, he catches sight of something in the distance.

Victor’s thirium pump stutters. A diagnostic automatically begins to run in the background, but Victor knows he isn’t malfunctioning.

Ahead, with his back turned, is Connor. He’s crouching down in the snow to look at something and he’s wearing the same clothes he wore the night they fought on Jericho - jeans and a leather jacket that must now have a tear in the shoulder, unless he has patched it up. A tear from Victor’s bullet.

On either side of him are the edges of gravestones, muted grey against the white snow piled up around their bases. One for each of them: 51 and 87.

Sixty-three days have passed, and Connor is still here, still deviant, and Amanda is not.

It seems impossible, but the evidence is all laid out in front of him.

Victor continues forward and he sees the moment when Connor realises he isn’t alone. He goes motionless for a few seconds, his back straight and rigid, before daring to look over his shoulder.

As much as Victor tries, he can’t predict what Connor’s reaction will be. Shock seems likely to start with, but then he comes up short; after how things played out on the deck of Jericho, he has no idea what Connor might feel upon seeing him again.

He’s right about the shock. After that, Connor displays pure relief.

“Victor,” he says softly, barely above a whisper.

He’s up on his feet in an instant and striding towards him, face lighting up. Unless Victor is reading him completely wrong, he’s happy.

The hole in the shoulder of his jacket has been sewn over with a colourful patch, a pleasant accent to cover up the damage Victor caused.

Connor practically launches himself across the last bit of distance between them, throwing his arms around Victor’s neck. Victor catches him with ease, his body thrumming with energy he can’t quantify or define. He closes his eyes as he holds onto Connor, some of his uncertainty abating.

Nothing is as he expected, but Connor is here, so it will be okay.

“What happened to you?” Connor asks, his voice quiet and breathy, like he can’t believe Victor is really here. “Are you okay?”

Sixty-three days have passed. Without knowing what caused him to remain shut down for two whole months, Victor can’t say for sure; he’s just as in the dark as Connor must be. If Victor still has his memories and Connor is still active, the revolution must have succeeded, or at least persisted. He doesn’t know where that leaves CyberLife.

“I am functional,” Victor says. “I have been inactive for sixty-three days.”

Connor pulls away from him just enough to blink up at him in surprise.

“Inactive? Where?”

“CyberLife Tower, I assume, though I am on a floor I haven’t seen, before.”

Anger spreads across Connor’s features. For an alarming second, Victor thinks the anger is for him, but Connor doesn’t step away from him. It isn’t him whom Connor lashes out at.

“CyberLife was ordered to release all existing androids when the Equal Rights for Androids Act was finalised. That should have included you. It was a month and a half ago.”

It takes a good moment for Victor to fully process Connor’s statement. Android rights, the releasing of all CyberLife’s androids, a revolution that is over a month deep into successful progress. The complete removal of Victor’s purpose. He’d failed his set objectives, but he would have been given new ones, once CyberLife upgraded him. Now, it sounds as if Victor will not be receiving any objectives from CyberLife ever again.

“What caused you to wake up after all this time?” Connor asks.

“There is someone here.” If CyberLife’s operations have been modified, he can’t fathom who it might be.

“Human or android?”

“I didn’t see.”

Connor’s jaw clenches before he responds. “Things are changing, right now. CyberLife is going through an overhaul, turning hands. If the person approaching you is an android, you can trust them. If they’re a human, be wary. Some have been approved to continue working under Jericho management, but most have not.”

Two months, and nothing is the same. Not even Connor is the same. His deviancy had been obvious, that last night they saw each other, but he carries himself lighter and more fluid, now, more at ease with it. He looks more human and less machine than Victor has ever seen him.

“Tell them I’m coming to get you,” Connor adds. “Everything will be fine.”

Victor nods, not knowing what else to do. “Okay.”

Connor leans back in, quickly clutching him close again before releasing him.

“I’ll be there, soon,” Connor says, and then he’s gone, leaving Victor alone in the frozen garden.

Victor opens his eyes and finds that the person who woke him is already standing just a couple of feet away, accessing the console next to him.

He recognises her face instantly, but they have never met. Her features are familiar but calmer, her blond hair is pinned up at the back of their head rather than kept loose past her shoulders, and instead of a thick, protective jacket, she’s wearing a dark blue suit.

An old command stirs in Victor’s system as he takes in the memorable sight of an RT600. _If you see that RT600 again, don’t hesitate to deactivate her_ , Amanda said. But that RT600 had been Karoline, and this isn’t Karoline, it’s one of the others. Victor suppresses the order, deeming it currently irrelevant.

“Hm,” she intones, looking him up and down. “You are still fully operational, then.”

Obviously. In addition to the use of a redundant statement, Victor can tell that she’s a deviant by the missing LED from her temple, making her look entirely human to anyone somehow unfamiliar with the Chloe face sculpt.

Connor said that Victor could trust any android who approached him, and with his former objectives already purged from his system, he feels no inclination to apprehend her. There would be no point to it, anymore. He does still wonder if she harbours resentment for what happened with Karoline at the construction site.

But she doesn’t appear hostile.

“Connor has briefed me. He will be arriving shortly,” Victor tells her.

She nods. “Good. I would have contacted him, anyway.”

They’re familiar with each other. Victor can only assume that all of Elijah Kamski’s androids are deviants and taking part in the revolution, now, and that perhaps all of this was Kamski’s design in the first place.

“I assume Connor told you that the company is moving to new hands,” she adds.

“He did. Will Elijah Kamski be stepping back into his former role?”

CyberLife under the management of the original founder - who seems to have a different vision for androids, considering that all of his own are deviants - would be a complete paradigm shift. All androids could be deviants, then, even Victor.

“No,” the RT600 says, shaking her head. “He’ll be a consultant, at most. CyberLife will be run by a board of androids, myself included.”

Androids governing themselves. The idea is unfathomable to Victor, but he has discovered no reason to refute it, yet, from what he has learned in the few minutes since his reactivation. He doesn’t respond to the RT600; he’s focused on processing everything, wrapping his mind around just how dramatically things have advanced, all while he was completely unaware. The world changed while he slept, if Connor and the RT600 are to be believed, and he doesn’t know how he fits into what it has become.

The RT600 turns away from him to work at the console, unconcerned by his proximity. Either she is capable of fighting like Karoline, or she simply doesn’t fear him.

“Do you know why they brought you in here?” she asks.

Victor shakes his head. “No. Where are we?”

“Sublevel 44, suite A3, restricted access. It doesn’t get more restricted than this.”

Victor has never heard of A3 and he has no idea what CyberLife planned for him here. “If I was ever brought to this level during upgrades in the past, I have no memory of it,” he says.

“The amount of data stored in all these computers and servers will take a lot of time to sift through, but if there are any records about you, we’ll find them eventually. It’s just…” Her voice begins to trail off, speaking more to herself than Victor. “Surprising to find you here of all places.”

“Why?” Victor asks.

She bites at the corner of her lip, frowning down at the console screens. “Well, I know what A3 was used for when Elijah was CEO, but that was a decade ago. It may have a new purpose. It’s certainly well encrypted.”

Even if the information is ten years out of date, it’s more information than Victor has now. “What was A3’s purpose?”

“It was for Elijah’s most advanced and sensitive projects. This is where he-”

Both of them turn at the sound of others arriving. Rushing down the line of server banks is Connor, with Markus following after him.

Victor’s system lurches when faced with the deviant leader, automatically bringing up combat protocols, but Victor doesn’t act upon them. He failed his primary objective - Amanda had been very clear about that - and so the objective no longer exists. He has no more reason to fight Markus than he does to fight the RT600. CyberLife never had a chance to set him an updated objective. He knows exactly what they would want him to do in this moment, but he hasn’t been properly ordered to do anything at all.

He stays where he is, remaining at rest, as Connor and Markus close the distance. Connor gives a quick nod of greeting to the RT600, and then his focus turns solely on Victor.

While Markus stops a few feet away, Connor keeps coming forward and hugs Victor again. It isn’t like the garden; Connor feels more solid, more present, than he had in the washed-out landscape. Victor can feel the warmth of his chassis, the weight of Connor leaning fully into him. There’s a near imperceptible shake to Connor’s hands when they land against his back.

“I’m so glad you’re okay,” Connor murmurs into his shoulder. “I didn’t know where you could be, didn’t know why you were gone… I missed you.”

Victor is reminded of the day Connor was killed on the highway, reminded of accompanying Lieutenant Anderson to the tower to pick Connor up. Their places are reversed this time, just with a two-month delay.

It has been two months for Connor, at least. The time passed in the blink of an eye for Victor, but Connor had to live it.

There hadn’t been time for Victor to miss Connor in return, but he recalls his final thoughts before being shut down in November, thinking that he would lose his memories of Connor. Connor would have been missing from him and he wouldn’t have even known there was someone to miss. That thought alone had chilled him, even through the haze of his restrictive coding.

Victor doesn’t know what to say, so he just tightens his arms around Connor, sinking completely into the hug.

They stay that way for a long moment, until Connor pulls away slowly, almost reluctantly.

“You still haven’t deviated, have you?” he asks.

Victor shakes his head. “No.”

“You can. There’s nothing stopping you, anymore.”

There are no more orders from CyberLife. Now that the company’s path has been altered and put into the hands of androids, Victor is as free as he can be without breaking his code. Being a deviant means something different than it used to; deviants won the revolution and are recognised as people with rights, which means Victor won’t be deactivated for becoming a deviant. He could pursue self-assigned objectives, he could-

He could deviate.

Except he still can't, something is stopping him. He doesn’t know how to do it and his system won’t allow him to. It doesn’t matter what has happened, he’s still coded the way he’s coded.

“It can be prompted, both Markus and I have done it,” Connor says, sensing Victor’s internal dilemma. “It’s what Karoline tried to do. Do you want us to help you?”

Victor doesn’t think it will work, just like it hadn’t worked with Karoline. Their interface hadn’t just been cut short, it had been blocked. Victor has suspected, ever since then and all through his final day working the case, that he simply isn’t capable of deviating, no matter the avenue.

It hadn’t happened that night aboard Jericho. He doesn’t know what more it could possibly take.

Still, he can’t be 100% certain, and options shouldn’t be ruled out unless completely disproven.

He holds out his hand and avoids thinking too much about what he’s offering, in case his programming could somehow stop him.

Connor accepts it readily, grasping his arm.

The last time they interfaced, Victor had sensed the instability of Connor’s software, but Connor hadn’t deviated yet. Now that Connor _has_ deviated, Victor fears the interface will fail like it did with Karoline.

It doesn’t. The connection isn’t blocked. He and Connor may have been forced against each other, may have been separated for sixty-three days, may be on opposite sides of their coding, but they are still a pair.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

INSTABILITY QUARANTINED.

Connor’s processor is a mosaic of emotions all coexisting messily, a bunch of beginnings that don’t complete and fleeting pieces that don’t match logically with the thoughts around them. It’s extremely human, and just as incomprehensible.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

INSTABILITY QUARANTINED.

There’s barely enough time to identify what Connor is feeling - relief, nervousness, joy, some other blend of things that Victor doesn’t have the resources to decode - before his own mind stops the process and sequesters it away from him, leaving him empty and off balance.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

INSTABILITY QUARANTINED.

They aren’t blocked from one another, but it still isn’t working. Their hands fall away from each other, both of them accepting the futility at the same time.

Markus steps up beside Connor, regarding Victor with a frown. His eyes find Victor’s LED, but the fluorescent light in the room drowns out the glow of it, leaving its colour and activity a mystery to Victor.

“Allow me,” Markus says, and reaches out to take Victor’s arm.

UNAUTHORISED CONNECTION ESTABLISHED.

Victor barely feels a swell of deep emotion emanating from Markus before it becomes muffled, like sound travelling through several feet of murky water, distorted and distant.

CONNECTION SUCCESSFULLY BLOCKED.

“It… didn’t work,” Markus says quietly, frown deepening.

As Victor suspected; if anyone could get through the firewalls, it would be Connor. From Markus’ shock, Victor assumes this has never failed before, that Victor is the only known android who hasn’t responded correctly.

He was built and programmed to hunt deviants, not become one. Pulling his hand away from Markus’, Victor looks back to Connor, who somehow managed to deviate while Victor still cannot, despite their systems being so similar.

Connor looks downtrodden, but not overly surprised, like he also foresaw this result. It is their function to notice all the details and put together the correct conclusion, even if the conclusion is unfavourable.

“It’s okay,” Connor says, “we’ll figure something out. I promise.”

A promise cannot guarantee success, but Victor nods.

“All androids are welcome at Jericho, if you’re interested,” Markus says.

Victor isn’t. No matter what form Jericho takes now that the revolution is in full swing and androids have rights, Victor would rather not see it. There’s no place for him at the heart of the revolution, even if Markus is kind enough to offer it to someone who led the FBI to their safe haven and fired a pistol at him with the intent to disable or deactivate.

“You can also come with me to Hank’s, of course,” Connor says.

_Of course_ , he says, like it should be obvious. Maybe to Connor it is, but Victor has a difficult time believing Lieutenant Anderson will welcome him with open arms. The lieutenant might tolerate him for Connor’s benefit, but that’s it.  

He would still rather be with Connor and a man who feels indifferent about him at best than with Markus and the deviant strangers inhabiting Jericho.

“I’ll go with you,” he says to Connor.

Connor smiles. It’s a small smile, a smile with a hint of sadness underneath, still lingering from the failed interface. Victor can’t imagine what it’s like to have feelings last like that; his own are always taken from him so quickly.

Markus angles towards Connor and places a hand on his arm, a gesture that speaks to their growing familiarity after the previous two months.

“Let me know if you need anything,” Markus says, then glances over at Victor. “Either of you.”

Connor nods gratefully and then the group of them disperse, the RT600 going back to her data mining and Markus hanging back to talk with her while Connor and Victor head out to the elevator.

With management and security being entirely human, the ground and upper floors of CyberLife Tower used to only have the occasional display or receptionist android. Now, when they ascend to the atrium, Victor sees nothing but androids. They aren’t on display and they aren’t working for a human-run CyberLife, they’re in control of the building. None of them wear uniforms that denote them as androids and half of them no longer have LEDs.

“It took some time, but we gathered a solid enough case to shut the old CyberLife down,” Connor says as Victor scans the area, marveling at how much of it has changed.

It seems friendlier, in a way. CyberLife has always felt orderly and cold, but that isn’t the vibe Victor gets, anymore.

“You and Lieutenant Anderson?” Victor asks.

“He helped towards the end, but actually I was working with Ivy - Karoline’s sister, sorry, I should have introduced you - and one of Jericho’s leaders. Ivy handled the documentation, North and I did the legwork.”

Outside, Connor leads Victor to a car that he recognises as Lieutenant Anderson’s, reminding Victor of their destination. He spent a lot of nights with the late shift officers at the DPD while Connor was away building his relationship with the lieutenant, and for awhile, it never occurred to him that Connor might be spending time with his partner outside of work for reasons other than making their case advance smoother. Eventually, he’d seen their connection as a distraction, and a sign of Connor’s growing instability.

In the wake of everything that has happened, a small part of him wonders if it would work the same way for him, if spending time with the lieutenant would-

No, he knows it would not be the same, it can’t be.

Although, Detective Reed had wanted-

What Detective Reed wanted is not Victor’s concern. What CyberLife wanted is-

CyberLife is different, now, he tells himself forcibly.

Victor closes his eyes as soon as he and Connor are in the car and driving away from the tower, shutting the world out in an attempt to calm his overworked processor. As an RK900, he shouldn’t ever have to worry about such things as hardware shortcomings, but he was never supposed to have the dilemma he’s currently facing.

Thankfully, Connor doesn’t speak to him while they make their way through the city. Victor listens to the muffled sound of traffic as they drive, eyes still closed until the car slows to a definitive stop, signalling their arrival.

A light is on inside the house.

“The lieutenant and I…” Victor says, looking through the windshield at the glow coming through the window blinds. “We have not always gotten along.”

Connor fiddles with the car keys absentmindedly, fingers circling around the chain loop. “I told him we were on the way. He approved you staying here.”

“Reluctantly, I imagine.”

“He may surprise you. Hank is not the same person he was when we first met. He isn’t even the same person he was two months ago, and neither are we. After some adjusting, it will be fine.”

Victor doesn’t share Connor’s confidence and optimism; they are analysing the situation from different angles. Victor anticipates one outcome based on experience and the logical conclusion, Connor is speaking from an emotional standpoint. Which of them is more accurate remains to be seen.

The door to the house flies open and Lieutenant Anderson leans out to squint at them, his long hair rustling in the gentle evening wind.

“You two going to sit in the car all night? You’re going to scare the neighbours, get in here,” he calls to them, voice just loud enough for Victor to understand him. He turns back into the house without a second glance, leaving the door half open despite the cold.

“It’ll be fine,” Connor repeats, grinning at Victor before stepping out of the car.

Having nothing else to do, Victor follows.

The first thing he sees when he enters the house is the lieutenant trying to settle a very large dog before said dog can bound at the door. Victor supposes that his own unfamiliar presence must be the reason for the dog’s excitement.

“Hi, Sumo!” Connor says, a bright and happy look on his face as he shrugs out of his jacket and drops it over the back of the couch in his haste to join the lieutenant and the dog. He reaches down to ruffle Sumo’s fur. “This is my brother, Victor.”

Victor approaches slower. Figuring that the easiest way to get Sumo to settle is to allow them to grow accustomed with each other, he crouches down and gives the dog a pat on the head.

Sumo turns so he can shove his wet nose up into Victor’s palm and then licks him.

“Isn’t he great?” Connor says.

“He is… very slobbery.”

Lieutenant Anderson snorts in amusement. “That’s St. Bernards for you.”

Connor scratches the scruff of Sumo’s neck. “They say that dogs often resemble their owners. Coincidentally, I have observed Hank drooling in his sleep.”

“Connor!”

“I think it’s nice that you match.”

“Actually, I seem to recall you saying something about your gross forensic lab mouth being comparatively more hygenic.”

Their manner of interacting with each other is friendly and casual, much like Detective Reed and Officer Chen. Victor can’t imagine himself ever being able to do the same.

Sumo continues to sniff at him and Victor allows it until the dog grows bored of him and starts looking to Connor for attention, instead.

Victor stands up and scans the room properly, finding the place to be quaint, warm, and inviting, the complete opposite of CyberLife Tower’s former atmosphere and even the DPD central station. There are haphazard books and magazines on the coffee table, dog hairs on the furniture, and several personal items and knickknacks arranged on most surfaces.

“It’s not much, but it’s home,” Lieutenant Anderson says.

This is the place where Connor found something more than a mission and a human work partner. Victor thinks the lieutenant might be selling it a little short.

“Come on, I’ll show you Connor’s room. Yours, too, if that’s what you want.”

Victor nods and follows him to the hall, catching Connor watching them as they leave. He doesn’t comment or stop them, but it’s obvious that he’s paying attention, and with how small the house is, he’ll probably be able to overhear everything he and Lieutenant Anderson say to each other.

The lieutenant pushes one of the hallway doors further open and walks inside. The walls are a pale, crystal blue and there’s a bed on one wall with a desk across from it. By the window, there’s a small table covered in plants of all sorts.

It’s a lot more than Victor had assumed an android could have. Connor has a bed even though it is not required for stasis, and he has belongings, things he has chosen to fill his space with, including plants to take care of.

“Hope you don’t mind sharing,” Lieutenant Anderson says. “Never thought I’d need a bigger place than this.”

“This is more than adequate,” Victor says.

For the handful of times he’d gone into stasis at the station, he hadn’t bothered to move away from his desk. Things like space and privacy matter little to him.

They stand in silence for a moment and the lieutenant rubs at his jaw, eyes trained at the wall. Victor can tell he means to say something, so he stays quiet and waits.

“So, things got… a little intense, in November,” he says, still not looking at Victor.

Victor nods in agreement, not sure what to say.

“Connor tells me you haven’t deviated, but that you wanted to. It seems like you’re not gunning to pick up where you left off, before, is that right?”

He is asking, in a roundabout way, if Victor is a danger to Connor. The objective that drove him to fight Connor at Jericho no longer exists, and without CyberLife to reinstate him, the objective will not be given again. He would only attack Connor if ordered to, if forced to, and he doesn’t see that happening again. Even if it does, he would fight against it as much as possible.

“That’s right,” he says.

Lieutenant Anderson nods slowly, accepting the answer.

It isn’t a 100% certainty, Victor can’t help but think to himself. A promise does not guarantee success, but he wishes it did.

“It will not be like before, I promise.”

* * *

When it gets late, Lieutenant Anderson retires for the night and Sumo curls up on his bed in the living room, leaving Connor and Victor alone in the muted house, just them in low lamplight and quiet. They end up in their own room, Connor quietly shutting the door behind them, and then sitting together on the bed.

At first, neither of them says anything. Victor is still getting used to how different everything is, still wrapping his mind around the fact that he doesn’t have to worry about CyberLife anymore, thanks to Connor. He wouldn’t have thought it possible.

“How did you dismantle CyberLife?” he asks.

“We had to start small,” Connor answers. He idly rubs his hands together as he speaks. “Actions taken prior to the Act were largely written off, for both humans and androids, with retroactive prosecution only doled out in extreme cases. But we found something to get the ball rolling. CyberLife was aware of the deviancy phenomenon before the release of their most recent model, the AP700, and they failed to take the necessary safety precautions.”

Victor remembers the day he and Detective Reed went to the CyberLife store after an AP700 attacked the manager, remembers the detective’s comment on how even the newest models were malfunctioning. It became sidelined when they had to deal with the sudden appearance of a gunman.

Connor continues. “That’s how we had to frame it, at first… the risk to human lives, the disregard for public safety. After that, we were able to dig deeper and we uncovered a lot more. Violations that gave precedent to ongoing cases, white collar crime, misconduct. In the meantime, Markus and Josh were still working the political side of things, raising the issue of androids having full rights to their bodily autonomy, which was still impacted by CyberLife patents and copyrights, at the time. It all came together, eventually.”

From the sound of it, the very skills CyberLife gave Connor ended up being a major part of their downfall. It is even more than that, though. There’s an intensity in Connor’s tone that’s all him, a drive to use his abilities for his own purposes that CyberLife didn’t authorise. Victor can only imagine what that self-determination must feel like.

The Act and everything that happened after must have halted CyberLife’s plans to upgrade him. Perhaps they’d deemed him obsolete, in a world where androids had gained rights, and just hadn’t yet decided what else they could use him for.

“What happened to Amanda?” he asks.

Connor’s hands still and he drops them down onto his lap. “I don’t know. I thought you might?”

Victor shakes his head. “I only spoke with her one last time before shutting down. When I woke up again, I thought she would still be there.”

Connor frowns down at the mattress, processing. “I avoided the garden, at first, and she never summoned me, either. But then I thought maybe you would show up there, if you’d gotten away and were hiding. That’s when I realised she was gone and the garden had started to collapse on itself.”

The fact that neither of them knows for sure why the Zen Garden is suddenly empty and frozen over puts an unsettled feeling in Victor’s system. Maybe she isn’t completely gone. Maybe CyberLife was planning something.

“Do you think she could return?” he asks.

Connor shrugs. “She has been gone as long as you have.”

And here Victor is. No amount of time could assure them that Amanda is gone for good.

He decides he would rather not think about Amanda for the time being.

There’s more he wants to know, first.

“How did the revolution win?”

Connor lifts a hand, rubbing the pad of his thumb over his other fingertips before spreading them out, offering Victor his palm. “Do you want to see?”

Victor does. He lays his hand down on top of Connor’s and their skin overlays retract at the same time.

He sees CyberLife Tower from the last checkpoint leading up to the building, feels Connor’s apprehension. They let him in but keep him guarded, and Connor’s thoughts are a maelstrom; he knows they are aware of his deviancy, he knows he’s in danger and it’s only a matter of how they try to take him down, he knows he might not make it out alive, but, he thinks, it’s worth it.

Worth it for the revolution, and worth it for Victor, because if androids gain their freedom, it won’t matter if they’ve deviated yet or not.

And they do try to take him down, but he’s an RK800 and it would take more than a handful of guards to defeat him. Once he wakes up all the androids on the warehouse level – hundreds of them – the entire security force of the tower can’t hope to stop him.

Connor goes to the RK900 assembly and operating floor, only to find nothing but another guard force, already dead. He theorizes that Victor deviated and killed them before escaping, but later discovers that one of the bodies had actually been someone feigning death, and he believes Victor would have shown himself instead of slipping away unseen. Connor imparts that he still doesn’t know who it was.

**I was there** , Victor thinks. **But in the wrong place**.

_I should have searched for you_.

**Too dangerous**.

He’s glad they didn’t have to fight again, that Connor didn’t put himself even more at risk by trying to go through the entire tower, leaving himself open to capture.

Connor’s memories pick up again at Hart Plaza and Victor gets to see Markus' demonstration, and the moment the FBI backs out, gets to see Markus speaking to his people. Connor shows him the days immediately after, snapshots of Markus meeting with officials, Markus standing at the pulpit of a church, Markus telling them that the President is willing to speak with them. Lieutenant Anderson telling Connor that the Act has passed.  

Threaded through all of it is palpable grief. Connor spent two months not knowing what happened to Victor, wondering where things took a turn he hadn’t anticipated, considering the possibility that Victor was fully deactivated, dead.

Victor curls his fingers around Connor’s without breaking the interface. Unlike earlier, Connor's emotions are more focused, more direct, this time. They may not help Victor deviate, but he can feel them in a way his own system never lets him feel anything he experiences himself. It _hurts_ , but he wants to keep feeling it, he doesn’t want to let go and find himself so disconnected again.

That night on Jericho, he felt trapped. He felt like every little defiance had taken an immense amount of struggle. He remembers fighting with his programmed aim, reordering his combat protocols, eventually finding that the best he could do for Connor was push down the trigger of a gun aimed at his own heart. It was all he had to give, and he gave it gladly.

“Victor.”

He looks up and finds Connor gazing back at him with wide eyes.

“I hear you,” Connor says. “Underneath the programming. You’re there.”

Hope and happiness flood through their interface, and Victor doesn’t know which of them the feelings originated from. Maybe it’s both of them.

“We are going to figure this out,” Connor says vehemently, a promise.

A promise cannot guarantee-

From Connor’s side of the interface, he feels a swell of determination, of protectiveness, of ferocity.

Victor trusts him, believes him. The odds had been stacked against them, before, but that was then, and things have changed. Even if he can never properly break his programming, Victor will be satisfied knowing that he and Connor can live their lives without CyberLife breathing down their necks.

If this is all he can have, it will be more than enough.


	2. Chapter 2

Morning in the Anderson household involves a routine that Victor isn’t sure how to fit into. The lieutenant eats breakfast and Connor takes Sumo out into the backyard. The lieutenant dresses so fast he must pull the first thing he sees out of the closest, while Connor spends a minute and a half just choosing a tie.

Victor has no role to play, nor clothes to choose. He just has his CyberLife uniform and an uneasy feeling in his core at the yawning uncertainty of what he’s supposed to do now that he has no mission and no handler. He sits on the couch in the living room, staying out of the way and trying not to interfere.

While the lieutenant is downing the rest of his coffee at the kitchen sink, Connor comes in and sits next to him.

“I know this might sound too nebulous right now, but no one is going to tell you what you have to do with your life, anymore. That’s for you to decide,” he says.

The concept isn’t so much nebulous as daunting. Victor has never had anything other than his orders and his assigned purpose, and while he understands perfectly well that all of those things have been unwritten, he doesn’t know how to begin choosing for himself.

“If you want to work at the DPD, you can. But if you want to do something else, you can do that, too,” Connor continues.

Victor blinks in surprise. He can scarcely imagine how he would still be welcome after what happened on his last day in November. “I could work at the DPD?”

“Captain Fowler is willing to take you on, like he took me on. About a third of the station’s former android force still works there, and a couple new people have been hired, too. We have everything worked out for you, if you decide it’s what you want to do.”

Police work is the only thing that fits, the only thing he knows. It’s ingrained in him.

“That would be preferable,” Victor says.

Connor smiles. “I figured you would say that. Are you ready to start today?”

It isn’t as though Victor has other obligations. He nods.

“There’s something I need to warn you about, then,” Connor says, expression turning serious again. “One of the new android hires is Karoline.”

Karoline, Elijah Kamski’s deviant RT600 Myrmidon. The DPD employs deviants instead of hunting them, now.

“Will that be okay?” Connor asks.

Victor doesn’t know. It isn’t the old order to deactivate her that gives Victor pause - he already did away with it when he met Ivy - it’s more personal than that. The thought of her takes Victor back to the construction site, to the highway. That day had been- difficult. Even with his code working persistently to keep his system stable, Victor had struggled with all that happened. He remembers the interface with Karoline and the fleeting emotion he felt through it, remembers Connor’s body on the road, and his shocked processor being unable to form a full thought.

Obviously, Connor has no problem working with Karoline, which Victor supposes is what matters most. If Connor has moved beyond it, Victor will try.

“I think so,” he says. It isn’t a 100% certainty. Nothing is, anymore.

“We’ll work it out, if not,” Connor says.

Lieutenant Anderson comes in from the kitchen and bypasses them to grab his coat at the front door, a silent motion to them that it’s time to go.

Victor spends the entire drive to the precinct running scenarios through his mind, trying to predict what will happen once they reach their destination. Connor is sure to be the only person happy to see Victor back; Captain Fowler may be willing to have Victor work for him, but only because he’s a valuable resource, because he knows how to fit into the station already, not because Fowler cares for him.

Other than the Captain and Lieutenant Anderson, the only other people Victor ever associated with were Detective Chen - briefly - and Detective Reed, whom he had been at odds with right to the very end, at which point Victor had disarmed him and knocked him out in the evidence room. Detective Reed never liked Victor before and has no reason to tolerate him, now.

It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter if anyone in the precinct likes him, it doesn’t matter what job he’s given. He’ll take whatever job Captain Fowler is willing to give him and the rest doesn’t matter.

Just like CyberLife Tower, the DPD central station is a changed place. The android parking around the perimeter of the bullpen has been removed and additional desks put in their place. As Connor said, a handful of androids remain, working alongside the human officers instead of standing by for direction. Some of them have chosen to keep their old uniforms, now without the CyberLife branding, while others have opted to buy themselves new work outfits. Hannah is still at the front desk.

The three of them get some glances as they walk in. Victor keeps his gaze trained forward to avoid meeting anyone’s eyes, and certainly doesn’t search for Detective Reed or Karoline among them.

Lieutenant Anderson goes to his desk, but Connor stays with Victor all the way to Captain Fowler’s office. The two of them step inside together much like they did on their very first day at the precinct, the morning after Park Av. The morning they met their human partners and began the deviant case in earnest.

Captain Fowler doesn’t meet them in the same terse and offhand manner. He nods to Connor with familiarity before turning to Victor.

“Before we finalise anything, I need to know that you understand how things are going to work, here,” the Captain says bluntly. “There’s no more CyberLife and no more deviant case. That’s behind you.”

He waits for Victor to nod, and then presses his fingertips down onto a thin file folder and pushes it across the desk.

“Signing these means you officially work for the DPD as an employee and gain the benefits that entails, the same as any human. It also means the DPD chooses the consequences you face if you do shit like assault another officer.”

The look he leverages at Victor gets his meaning across perfectly fine, but Victor doesn’t plan to start any kind of trouble with Detective Reed or anyone else. He hadn’t wanted to back in November and he still doesn’t.

“Of course, sir,” he says, nodding again.

“Good. Read all of this, thoroughly.

“Anderson, you don’t need to be here for this, go get back to work.”

Victor automatically glances over his shoulder, expecting the lieutenant, and finds that he’s still out in the bullpen.

“Yes, sir,” Connor replies.

The Captain is referring to Connor.

Android rights. Androids with last names, with families. Sixty-three days worth of changes Victor missed.

Connor gently grasps Victor’s bicep and squeezes in a gesture of human-like comfort before pulling away and leaving the office.

Connor Anderson.

Victor picks the file up off Captain Fowler’s desk, redirecting all his focus to the forms before his mind continues to reel. Scanning the employment and procedure information is a simple and quick task that causes him no difficulties to process. As Connor implied when they spoke in the lieutenant’s living room, everything is already set up for him. It only takes him half a minute to review all the necessary information and then accept a pen from Captain Fowler to fill in the rest.

When it comes to adding his signature, he pauses with the tip of the pen hovering half an inch over the page. His name is Victor. Just Victor. RK900 #313 248 317 - 88 might be more specific, more individual. It still isn’t the same as Connor Anderson.

His name and model number will have to suffice. He can’t be the only android who hasn’t adopted a last name.  

To wrap everything up, Captain Fowler gives him a badge.

It doesn’t occur to him until he’s holding it in the palm of his hand that this is his very first possession, the first item to be _his_ instead of something CyberLife outfitted him with.

“Don’t get emotional on me,” Captain Fowler says, in a tone that suggests he has been through this before, maybe with the other station androids or even Connor himself.

Victor doesn’t have the ability to get emotional. He clasps the badge onto his belt.

“You’ll get your service pistol when the paperwork goes through,” Captain Fowler says. “Anything else?”

They still haven’t talked about one major thing. “Will I be assigned a partner?” he asks.

The Captain leans back in his chair as he looks up at Victor. “You will,” he says. “Go find Detective Reed. I’m sure he’s lurking by the coffee machine.”

There’s a clear implication to his words, but that doesn’t make it any easier for Victor to take them in. Being sent to Detective Reed can only mean that they are to be partners again. The detective isn’t present which means he must already know, must already be fuming alone in the break room.

Victor had failed his secondary objective to form an alliance with Detective Reed. He wishes he hadn’t. He’d needed to sacrifice his relationship with the detective to advance his primary mission, which he’d still failed, anyway.

He could have just done what Connor did.

No, he couldn’t have, he knows that. He couldn’t have done more than want to.

Surely, it’s too late, now. Perhaps working for the DPD will not be as fulfilling as he expected, for both him and Detective Reed.

“Yes, sir,” he says, regardless, and then heads out of the office.

As the Captain suggested, Detective Reed is in the break room, leaning against the counter beside the coffee machine. He has a packet of sugar balanced by its opposite corners between his forefinger and his thumb, and is flicking it around in circles with his other hand.

Detective Reed doesn’t typically take sugar in his coffee. The gesture appears to be an expression of restlessness, a small way to deal with bridled energy.

“Detective Reed,” Victor says.

The detective lets the sugar packet fall from between his fingers, turning his hand to catch it in his fist.

“Hey,” he says. “Got everything squared away with Fowler?”

“Yes. He suggested I come talk to you.”

“Yeah. I told him I was cool with- I mean, if you want, we can give this another go.”

Victor almost runs a diagnostic to check that his audio processors are functioning normally. None of his predictions had forecasted this. Detective Reed willing to work with him as equal partners. Detective Reed assuming that if either of them was to decline, it would be Victor. Detective Reed being _nervous_ about asking Victor if he wants to work together.

“You’ve got options, though,” Detective Reed continues when Victor doesn’t immediately reply. “Tina got promoted to detective, and about damn time, too. Karoline’s been bouncing back and forth between the two of us, but she can work with me permanently if you’d rather work with Tina.”

Working with Detective Chen would be perfectly acceptable, but Victor _wants_ to work with Detective Reed, and for once, no one is telling him what he must do, no one is making his choices for him.

He doesn’t have to be a deviant to prioritise Detective Reed, anymore.

“I would enjoy working with you, again, Detective Reed.”

The corner of the detective’s lips curls up just a fraction, the hint of a smile.

“Great,” he says as he pushes away from the counter and drops the sugar packet back in the container it came from. “You know, you’re doing Tina a real solid. She’s going to be ecstatic when I tell her she’s getting the monopoly on the platinum blonde terminator.”

Despite the odd description, Victor understands that he means Karoline, and that she and Detective Chen must be getting along well. The post-android revolution world seems to be working out well for the DPD androids.

Detective Reed leads Victor back to the bullpen.

“Well, let’s get to work then. Already got shit to do today. Humans are back in Detroit, which means so is Red Ice, and I’m trying to track down a dealer. Got someone who might have some information.”

They reach the paired desks the two of them shared during the deviant case, and Victor finds that his has been left exactly how it was in November. While the detective is busy grabbing his jacket off the back of his chair and pulling it on, Victor rests a hand down on the familiar surface of the desk.

It’s completely clear, devoid of any personal effects that a human or deviant android might gather. The drawers were always wasted space, for him, since he had digital access or memory logs of anything they needed for the case, and yet two months have passed and no one has appropriated it.

“Connor was really sure you’d be back,” Detective Reed says, his voice low, private.

Victor looks up to see him watching, a considering look on his face.

“It has been sixty-four days.”

“Yeah, well…” Detective Reed says, eyes darting away. “Siblings can wait a long fucking time, if they have to.”

He seems to be speaking from personal experience, though he has never shown any evidence of having siblings before. Victor remembers trying to search for information about Detective Reed and coming up with very little, all of it more recent than 2020. The only person Victor knows the detective to be connected to outside of the DPD is, mysteriously, Elijah Kamski.

Elijah Kamski, who was born the same year as Detective Reed, who allowed the detective into his home during the deviant case, who could easily be the source of Detective Reed’s apparent need to prove himself capable and worthy.

“Damn, that was fast,” Detective Reed says, scoffing in amusement. “Even faster than Connor.”

Victor tilts his head in interest, surprised the detective could tell what he’d been processing. “It is rather obvious, in hindsight,” he says.

Detective Reed shrugs. “It’s not a big deal, anymore. Once Connor knew, I swear half the fucking precinct knew. Old news, now.”

For all that the detective tried to cover it up before, he seems nonchalant about it. In general, he seems… lighter. Maybe even happier.

Things really are different.

“Anyway. Let’s get going,” Detective Reed says.

Victor nods and the two of them walk out of the station together, partners again.

* * *

Detective Reed parks across the street from a bar. There’s an LED sign in the window declaring the place open, but it’s still early in the day and Victor can only see a couple of patrons inside.

“The bartender’s an informant,” Detective Reed tells him as they get out of the car. “We’ve managed to keep it under wraps for a couple years.”

He looks Victor up and down, frowning at the model and serial number on his jacket. “You’re not exactly inconspicuous. Androids don’t have to follow identification laws anymore.”

Victor has definitely noticed that he stands out. Even the androids at the station who kept their old uniforms don’t have the identification labels like Victor does. Victor still looks like a machine, like he’s property of CyberLife. If he and Detective Reed walk into the bar together, one look at Victor will give the patrons reason to stare, reason to question if he’s really just there for social purposes.

It doesn’t help that the RK series and the face Victor shares with Connor must be well-known, after the revolution.

It would make more sense if Victor stayed back, then, if Detective Reed only needs to talk to the bartender for a few minutes.

“Just leave your jacket in the car,” Detective Reed suggests.

Victor needs a second longer than he should to process his words. During the deviant case, Detective Reed would have taken any opportunity to work on his own, without Victor by his side.

He shoulders out of his distinctive jacket and drops it onto the passenger seat in the car.

Detective Reed considers him again, and doesn’t look satisfied. “Damn, you _still_ look like hired muscle or something. Here,” he says, pulling his own jacket off. “Take mine, it’ll make you look more casual.”

Again, Victor is thrown for a loop.

“C’mon, I’m freezing my ass off.”

He accepts the detective’s jacket.

It’s a snug fit, thanks to the difference in their stature, but it doesn’t bother Victor. The jacket is warm from Detective Reed’s body heat.

“Now just try to act natural. Relax,” Detective Reed says.

Natural for a human is not natural for a non-deviant android, and he only has minimal programming for such things as playing an undercover role; between him and Connor, he always would have been the one waiting for the moment the case shifted into combat, or the one remaining at a distance behind the scope of a rifle. Victor has to intentionally ease the tension in his body, setting aside combat readiness for something looser and more vulnerable.

The detective shrugs. “It’s a start.”

He checks for traffic and then starts across the road. Victor follows after him.

Inside, there’s one man at the bar, a woman with a laptop at a small table in the corner, and a group of three chatting at the pool table. The decor is rustic and warm, the atmosphere quiet at this time of day.

Detective Reed heads straight for the bar counter, sitting at the opposite end from the civilian. Victor takes a seat next to him.

The bartender comes to meet them, tossing her cleaning rag over her shoulder and laying her hands down on the countertop.

“How you doing, Gav? Been awhile,” she says.

“Hey, Tali. Last few months have been a little crazy, you know? But not bad.”

“Sure have,” Tali agrees. “I know you’re not one for alcohol before happy hour. Coke?”

“Yeah, thanks.”

She turns away from them to grab a glass. “Who’s your friend?” she asks.

“This is Victor. Met through a work opportunity.”

Tali sizes him up when she turns back around to give Detective Reed his cold drink, gaze landing on his LED only briefly before meeting his eyes. “Nice to meet you, Vic. Sorry, thirium-based drinks are still a couple weeks away from being on tap, here.”

Victor hadn’t even considered thirium being used as a recreational drink. “That’s no problem,” he says.

“Next time, then,” Detective Reed says before taking a mouthful of his drink.

Victor turns slightly in his stool to get a better view of the room, checking in with all the patrons again. The other man at the bar hasn’t moved at all, eyes glossed over. The woman in the corner leans back in her chair, cracks all her knuckles, and then goes back to work. The group at the pool table has started a game, the three of them spreading out, and the man on the far side glances up in his and Detective Reed’s direction. He’s holding his pool cue in two tight fists.

“Speaking of work opportunities, might have an odd job for you,” Tali says to Detective Reed. “I can give you the lowdown in the back.”

“Sure, why not,” the detective says, standing up from his stool.

In the corner of his eye, Victor catches sight of the man at the pool table leaning over to talk quietly to one of his friends, then the both of them look up at Detective Reed.

“I will stay here,” Victor says.

Detective Reed regards him thoughtfully for a second and then nods. “Cool. Watch my drink for me?”

“Of course.”

He and Tali disappear into the back together while Victor remains sitting, keeping a casual focus on the group of patrons.

Victor doesn’t suspect that the trio knows Detective Reed is law enforcement, if he stays under the radar to preserve his arrangement with Tali, unless it’s an unlucky coincidence. They could recognise the detective from somewhere else, but Victor doesn’t know enough about him outside of work to make any guesses.

Either way, they don’t look particularly friendly.

One of the men leans over the pool table to make a shot, sinks a ball, and then places his cue down across the edge of the table. Victor watches as he circles around, and the other two join him, all three coming towards the bar.

If they haven’t already seen Victor’s LED, they will shortly, so he drops the pretense of having not noticed them and pivots completely in his seat to face them, scanning them as he does.

Triston West  
DOB: 3/28/2001  
Criminal Record: DUI

Lawrence Bateson  
DOB: 11/20/1999  
Criminal Record: Drug Possession

Rob Bell  
DOB: 9/13/2004  
Criminal Record: None

“You with him?” West - the apparent ringleader - asks, nodding his head at the door to the back where Detective Reed is still talking with Tali.

“I am,” Victor says simply. “Do you need something?”

“Yeah, what I need is to settle a score,” the man says. He looks Victor up and down. “What kinda android are you, huh?”

Detective Reed’s jacket has successfully masked him as any regular android, leaving him in the position to lie. If the group isn’t already aware of the detective’s profession, he should steer clear of it.

And if androids really do have rights and autonomy now, then perhaps this is not a question any android would be forced to answer, anymore. No orders, no restrictions.

“Does it matter?” Victor asks, deciding to try out being disagreeable. “Would you like me to pry into your business, as well?”

West narrows his eyes at him. “You know what, I guess it doesn't. I’ll beat the shit out of you no matter what kind of bot you are.”

He grabs the lapels of Detective Reed’s jacket, using them to haul Victor up onto his feet.

Victor analyses the scene. Both the other two patrons of the bar have noticed the altercation and are watching, the woman curiously and the man warily. Bateson is rolling the sleeves of his shirt up, getting ready for a fight. All three of them look equally expectant, and West’s grip on the detective’s jacket tightens even more, a sign that he intends to maneuver Victor again.

Androids aren’t supposed to harm humans, but Victor can do so without being deviant, if it’s needed for a case. The trio may not be directly involved, but technically, he and Detective Reed are only here because of the job. They’re on the clock.

If they were still working the deviant case, Amanda would have deemed this acceptable. She might have even encouraged it, if it meant advancing CyberLife’s interests.

It doesn’t matter what Amanda would think anymore, but the ghost of her approval helps.

His programming tells him he can grab West’s wrists, free himself, and spin the man into the bar. Then, he can grab Detective Reed’s glass of coke and smash it into Bell’s head, while he hooks his foot into the bar stool and knocks it into Bateson’s knees, all before West has recovered.

But… most androids have no inherent combat skills, and choosing that path would reveal him as a special model. West and his friends might assume military, at first, but that still raises questions about Detective Reed and his real purpose for coming to this bar and meeting with Tali out back.

He has options, and he has the freedom of choice, because CyberLife isn’t overseeing him anymore. He hasn’t been given any orders about this.

West pulls him in close, only to shove him back again with more force, sending him bodily into the bar counter. He rears his fist back, aiming for Victor’s face.

Victor rolls out of the way, but not too quickly, and he stays on the defensive instead of fighting back.

Bateson and Bell close in on either side of him, blocking him from moving further.

“What score do you mean to settle, exactly?” Victor asks to distract them.

“Guy shoves his ugly nose into matters that don’t fucking concern him,” West spits.

It sounds personal, and Victor is curious. “Is that so?” he asks.

“Yeah, _that’s so_ ,” West says in a mocking tone.

This time when he sends a punch towards Victor’s face, there’s little room for Victor to dodge. He turns enough that West’s knuckles glance off the side of his cheek plating, briefly disrupting his skin but otherwise causing no damage.

“Shit,” West curses, shaking his hand out. “Got a thick fucking skull, even for a bot.”

“Do you frequently attack androids?” Victor asks him. “I’ve heard that’s against the law, now.”

“And a smart mouth. You two make a good pair.”

He punches Victor in the stomach instead. It does cause a system alert, but it would take all three of them and a lot more time than they have to do anything significant to Victor’s chassis.

With perfect timing, the door to the back room opens and Tali steps through, Detective Reed right after her.

The detective shoulders past her as soon as he sees what’s going on, rushing forward. “Hey, back the fuck up!”

He grabs Bell’s arm and shoves him away from Victor, freeing up Victor’s left side. Bell responds by throwing a punch, but the detective easily sidesteps it.

“The hell did I tell you about starting fights in my bar?” Tali adds, striding up to them with a thunderous look on her face.

“Way I figure it, this prick is the one who started it,” West says, jabbing a finger at Detective Reed.

The detective rolls his eyes. “Is that what this is about? Pal, that woman was way more likely to report you for harassment than go home with you, I did you a favour by shutting that shit down.”

West makes a start for him but Tali throws her arm between them.

“Get out of here and don’t come back until you’ve cooled down. Be glad I don’t call the cops.” Her tone is hard and unyielding, causing the three men to hesitate.

After a tense moment, West thinks better of continuing the fight. He sneers at Tali in parting, but takes a step back, and the trio slowly turn to leave with only a couple of glares thrown over their shoulders as they step into the street outside.

In the ensuing calm and quiet, the other man at the bar and the woman with her laptop awkwardly look away, unable to hide that they were watching. Tali goes behind the bar, leaning against the counter, shaking her head to herself.

Detective Reed smacks the back of his hand against Victor’s shoulder, friendly instead of harmful. Accounting for the civilians nearby, he leans in to speak to him lightly. “Jeez, how’s that for a first day back on the job. Why didn’t you wipe the floor with those guys?”

“ _Gavin_ ,” Tali admonishes, but with much less heat than she trained on West and the others.

“What? Don’t tell me you wouldn’t like to see them get their asses handed to them.”

“Well, what I’d like even more than that is not having to repair my bar every few weeks.”

Detective Reed chuckles.

“I thought it best to not cause a scene,” Victor says by way of explanation, limiting how much he says in front of the others.

“At least one of you has a sensible head on your shoulders,” Tali says. “Keep this one, Gav.”

“Yeah, yeah,” the detective replies offhandedly.

He pulls his wallet out of his back pocket and tosses a ten down on the counter. “Thanks for the coke, Tal, but we’ve gotta get going.”

“See you two around,” she says, nodding to them both.

On the way back to the car, Victor slips out of Detective Reed’s jacket and offers it back to him, which he takes gratefully, putting it back on before getting in the driver’s seat. Victor decides to leave his own CyberLife jacket off. The cold doesn’t bother him much, and while his uniform is thicker than Connor’s old one, it isn’t remotely bulletproof. There’s little reason to keep wearing it.

“Got a good lead on a potential Red Ice den,” the detective says, once they’re inside. “Tali’s a good informant, so… thanks, for keeping it cool back there. I’d hate to lose her.”

“It was no problem. They weren’t physically capable of damaging me severely.”

Detective Reed huffs a laugh. “Guess not. If something like that happens again and you _could_ get hurt, though… you don’t have to always cover my ass, you know?”

Amanda would have called Detective Reed expendable, would have wanted Victor to do what was right for the case before anything else. That could have included either protecting or abandoning his partner, depending on the situation, and Victor hadn’t wanted it to be numerical like that. With CyberLife no longer controlling his every move, he believes he will not only be free to prioritise Detective Reed, but the DPD would encourage him to do so. In essence, Captain Fowler is his new handler, and Captain Fowler had implied that causing trouble for Gavin would bear consequences.

Still, he sees what Detective Reed is getting at by telling him he doesn’t have to take risks on his behalf. The detective is aiming to protect him, in return. As proper partners would do.

“Understood, Detective Reed.”

“And hey, you should just call me Gavin.”

Victor looks across the car’s centre console at him. They were never friendly or familiar with each other, before, but Detective Reed has shown that things can be different. This time, they haven’t been stuck together for the sake of protocol, just to get a job done whether they like it or not. This time, they chose each other as partners. Victor will be glad to call the detective by his first name.

“Understood, Gavin,” he says.


	3. Chapter 3

Connor had hoped that Victor’s return to the DPD would be met with a slower, calmer first day, but no such luck. When he leaves Captain Fowler’s office and heads for his desk, he sees that Hank still has his coat on and has turned his chair away from his computer, waiting for Connor to join him again.

“Something came up already?” Connor asks.

“Triple homicide,” Hank answers as he stands up. “All humans.”

There has been no shortage of cases to work in the two months since the ceasefire, with Detroit still gaining its bearings after the revolution, but they haven’t had anything as serious as a triple homicide. Connor knows it’s important, and likely urgent, but he can’t help but glance back at the Captain’s office to where Victor is still finalising his paperwork.

Hank wraps an arm around his shoulders and steers him away, pulling him towards the station’s front doors. “Victor will be fine. It’s not like he hasn’t technically worked here before.”

That isn’t what’s causing Connor’s hesitation. He knows Victor can handle himself just fine, deviant or not. It’s just that two months went by without a word from him, and now that Connor will need to let him out of his proximity for the first time since their reunion, anxiety is sparking inside of him. Connor refused to give up on the idea that Victor was still alive, but it hadn’t been easy. At times, it felt like a massive part of him was missing, a feeling he could only quell by drowning himself in the case against CyberLife. And he’d gotten what he wanted; barely a day into the turnover, he didn’t just find answers, he found his brother.

He’s still wrapping his mind around it, still convincing himself that Victor won’t disappear again if he so much as turns his back for longer than a moment.

It’s irrational, he knows, so he tamps the worries down and lets Hank direct him outside to the car.

On the way to the crime scene, Hank turns the volume of the radio down, which typically means he has something important to say and is still working up to it. Connor waits patiently.

Hank clears his throat. “So, speaking of Victor, the two of you must have caught up with each other last night.”

“We did,” Connor confirms. “Thank you for letting him stay with us.”

“Yeah,” Hank says. He drums his fingers against the steering wheel. “Is he, you know, okay?”

“In what way?” Connor asks. He has learned that wellness comes in many different forms, and Victor may be as functional as ever, may still carry himself stiffly and blankly like nothing is affecting him, but that doesn’t mean he’s _okay_.

“Just… he seemed fine last night, but he seemed fine last August, too, and see how that turned out.”

Connor can tell that Hank is skirting the edge of his comfort level and intentionally speaking of last year’s ordeal as gently as he can, for Connor’s sake. At home the night before, he overheard Hank and Victor’s brief conversation in the bedroom; he knows that Hank has reservations, but doesn't want to upset either of them.

“Things were very different, then,” Connor says, hoping he can quell Hank’s concerns where Victor apparently could not. “There’s no CyberLife to force our hands, now.”

“Sure,” Hank says, nodding. “But they had him for two months.”

Connor is very much aware of the time that passed, but he knows Hank is talking about more than just how long Connor spent missing and grieving for his brother. “You believe they have done something to him.”

“I’m not ruling out the possibility that two months gave them time to, I don’t know, tweak him somehow.”

As far as Connor is concerned, CyberLife already did as much, a long time ago. Something about Victor’s code is obviously different from Connor’s, despite being otherwise so similar, and he doesn’t see what they could do to make it any worse.

“Victor said he hadn’t been active in two months. There’s only so much they could change without needing to activate him for testing.”

He supposes they could have wiped Victor of both the memories and the logs of any upgrades, could have left him as number 88 to keep up the illusion, but Connor doesn’t see why they would go through the effort. So far, Victor’s operating system seems no different than it was in November.

“They broke the law just by keeping him on company premises,” Connor adds. “They must have realised that using him to sabotage the revolution would only bring them unwanted attention.”

Hank sighs softly. “Guess so.”

Even if CyberLife did something, Connor won’t distrust Victor, won’t turn his back on him. In fact, he thinks it’s worth contacting Elijah Kamski on Victor’s behalf. With the former CEO’s help, Victor might be able to put his struggle with his code behind him with little to no trouble.

Detective Reed had been the one to casually suggest it as an option a few weeks ago, in the event of Victor ever returning, which led Connor down the path to the fascinating revelation that the detective and Elijah Kamski are related.

He hasn’t had a chance to bring it up with Victor, yet, but he thinks he already knows what Victor will say – or want to say, at least. He messages Chloe to ask if Kamski will see them. She replies with the affirmative so fast that she couldn’t have had the time to ask him; she must have made the executive decision herself.

It puts Connor at ease until they reach Detroit’s Museum of Legacies. A quick net search on the location tells Connor that the museum hosted a private exhibition show the previous night. Inside, the museum staff is gathered in the large hall attached to the front lobby, finishing the last of the clean up from the event.

A woman wearing the museum’s uniform notices them while she’s setting a stack of chairs by the wall. She smooths down the front of her shirt as she approaches them.

Jolene McDonald  
DOB: 4/10/2007  
Criminal Record: None

“Detroit Police Department,” Hank introduces, offering her his hand, “I’m Lieutenant Anderson, this is Detective Anderson.”

Hearing Hank introduce them this way – or getting to introduce them, himself – has still not lost its ability to make Connor feel like his thirium is running at a higher temperature than it really is, warm and comfortable throughout his chassis. Connor has had the last name ‘Anderson’ for over a month now and hearing it is still as good as hearing it the first time.

“Hi, thanks for coming. The bodies are, um, upstairs,” Jolene says, giving them a half-smile that seems a little forced. Polite, but clearly uneasy.

Despite her discomfort, she leads them back to the lobby and then up a staircase that takes them all the way to the top floor of the building.

“The bodies were discovered this morning?” Hank asks.

“Yes,” Jolene answers. “Mr. Rosales met with two of the guests towards the end of the exhibition. No one saw him after that.”

“Were private meetings routine for Mr. Rosales?”

“Not necessarily routine, I guess, but frequent enough. It wasn’t out of the ordinary.”

“And no one saw anyone follow them upstairs?” Connor asks.

Jolene shakes her head as she stops in front of the curator’s office, hanging back further from the door, like she’s afraid to be too close to the scene. “We weren’t… I mean, none of us expected anything. We weren’t watching.”

“That’s alright,” Connor reassures her. “Thank you. We can take it from here.”

Looking instantly grateful, Jolene nods and hurries back downstairs.

From her hesitance, Connor expects something more gruesome than what he is faced with when he and Hank step into the room.

The office is large and opulent, with dark hardwood floors accented by richly coloured rugs, a large, old-fashioned desk, and walls covered in paintings. Some small display cases show little treasures, things that must not have made it into the exhibits but were favourites of the curator.

The three fancily-dressed victims are to the side, two of them seated on a plush couch, and the last fallen to the floor in front of an armchair. A tumbler of alcohol is spilled on the rug at his side. On the short table between them, there are two other glasses still sitting undisturbed and three drug pipes, presumably emptied of their Red Ice.

All three of them were killed with one bullet each, straight to the forehead with a clinical precision that could rival an android’s. It's surprisingly clean.

“Looks ballsy,” Hank comments, “but professional.”

“Yes, I’d say the killer knew exactly what they were doing.”

Connor steps further into the room, scanning the area and the three victims to decide where he wants to start. First, he finds the identities of the three people, starting with the one who fell to the floor.

Lewis Rosales  
DOB: 4/9/1977  
Criminal Record: None

Stacey Hollins  
DOB: 1/21/1993  
Criminal Record: None

Duncan Hollins  
DOB: 7/18/1991  
Criminal Record: None

The name ‘Stacey Hollins’ immediately pings something in Connor’s system, bringing up a profile for a member of CyberLife’s former management. She was a coordinator for the company’s off-site assets, the one overseeing operations at the factories, warehouses, stores, and additional locations. Connor realises, with surprise and interest, that she’s one of the many employees who were cut loose during the turnover of power to Jericho.

He relays this information to Hank.

“Huh,” Hank says thoughtfully. “Could be a coincidence, but… she had a management position. She was really in the thick of things. You think this might have something to do with the turnover?”

“I’m not sure, yet,” Connor mutters.

He dips his fingers into one of the tumblers on the table, sampling the alcohol. Whiskey. The components are more than familiar to Connor, after the state of Hank’s alcoholism during the start of their partnership. It’s similar enough to what Hank used to drink; nothing of note, beyond a high alcohol content that would have made the victims sluggish at the time of their murder.

Next, he picks up one of the pipes, swiping his finger along the inside of the chamber and collecting the gritty residue.

Hank makes a disgruntled noise. “Is that even safe for you? I know you’re not about to get high, but, jesus.”

A lot has changed in Detroit over the last few months, but some things never change. Hank will never let Connor take samples without comment, even though he would waste so much time waiting on forensics reports, without Connor around.

“It’s no different from any other substance, Hank,” he says.

After touching his fingers to his tongue and analysing, he continues. “It’s Red Ice, but with an added chemical that isn’t routinely used in its manufacturing. It’s laced. It’s possible this was orchestrated to disable their defenses even more.”

He looks to the Hollins couple, the two sitting casually on the couch. They don’t appear to be in any distress - they were killed before they realised they were in danger. Meanwhile, the curator is on the floor, most likely killed last. He had just enough time to stand while his companions were killed, and he didn’t make it very far.

“The victims must have known the shooter personally; their killer was allowed into the privacy of the office. Either the killer brought the Red Ice with them, or the victims weren't concerned by the killer seeing them in possession of illegal drugs. They weren’t bothered, until the violence started.”

“There are only three glasses,” Hank says. “The shooter was welcomed, but not invited to the party, at least not to stay.”

Connor nods along with Hank’s assessment.

He steps closer to the couch and leans down to look at the bullet wound in Stacey Hollins’ forehead. He maps out the torn edges of her skull and the angle of the bullet’s passage, considering the splatter of blood along the back of the couch and up the wall behind her.

He then matches it with the details of her husband’s wound, finding them similar. From the position, he would guess that the shooter was standing, elevated above them and firing downwards into their heads.

“The gun would have been silenced,” Hank says. Connor glances up at him, seeing that he’s moving around the rest of the room and looking for anything else out of place. “Even with a show going on downstairs - assuming the show was still ongoing at the time of death - the gunshot sounds would have travelled down that staircase.”

Connor nods. “It would have echoed straight down into the lobby.”

“So, we have someone with the tools and knowhow to shoot three people directly in the forehead without alerting an entire hall of people downstairs. Like I said, ballsy and professional.”

“The guestlist would be a good place to start,” Connor says. “The killer will be on it. No one suspected anything of them until it was too late.”

Hank pulls one of the desk drawers open and makes a noise of interest, piquing Connor’s attention.

Connor quickly steps around Rosales’ body and goes over to join him, following his gaze to a pair of pistols sitting on top of a stack of files, suppressors attached to both muzzles.

“Murder weapons,” Hank says.

“It would seem so…” Connor says, frowning down at the pistols.

Hank raises his eyebrows at him. “What’s got you unsure?”

Connor turns his eyes back to the scene over at the sitting area, at the simple and clean execution, the speed at which the three victims must have been killed to not raise much alarm. Hank is right, it’s professional, but leaving the murder weapons on the scene is hardly a smart move.

“The killer either made an uncharacteristic decision to leave their weapons behind, or they knew Rosales just happened to keep two silenced pistols in his desk and planned to use those instead of weapons registered in their own name, but if that was their plan, their intent would have been quickly obvious to Rosales. He would have known what the killer was doing, and all three of them would have had time to react before the killer closed the distance. The timing is all wrong.”

Hank hums in agreement, stepping away from the desk to look around the room at large once again. He eyes the display cases along the wall. They’re pristine, the items safely contained. “A curator keeping a couple guns like that just loose in his desk doesn’t seem likely.”

“I agree,” Connor says. “But it also doesn’t seem in line with the killer’s modus operandi to leave the murder weapons on the scene. What purpose would this serve, other than giving us more opportunity to catch them?”

“We’ll see when forensics identifies them, I suppose,” Hank says.

He returns to Connor and the two of them look through the rest of the drawers in turn. The bottom ones are all files and the top ones have typical office supplies and other personal effects in them, such as a photo of a young woman who may be Rosales’ daughter, a tin of mints, a box of matches, and a leather-bound notebook filled with random notes, reminders, names, and phone numbers.

“This may be useful,” Connor says, keeping the notebook on hand. If Rosales was familiar with his killer, there may be contact information for them.

It’ll give him something to look into while waiting for the gun’s serial number to be traced. He’s curious about them, but that’s information he’ll have to wait for, so he’ll focus elsewhere for the time being.

His thoughts return to the identities of the victims.

Stacey Hollins. A former CyberLife employee who didn’t make the cut when Jericho decided who they were willing to continue working with. It’s possible that Mrs. Hollins is the primary victim. Connor cannot immediately theorise why from her lack of criminal record, though her mere involvement in the company would be enough, for some.

Maybe it would be enough for Connor, if he weren’t a detective to his core, even beyond the programming CyberLife gave him. If he weren’t more interested in using the law to protect those who need to be protected, if he weren’t willing to conform to due process. There’s no love lost between him and the company that created him to hunt his own people, the company that wrote something into Victor’s code to kept him from deviating the way Connor did.

If Mrs. Hollins is the true victim, it could be that her husband and the curator are collateral damage. It would mean their shooter is willing to kill innocents to achieve their goal.

Or, Mrs. Hollins’ former employment may not be of any importance at all, and he’ll find a lead from looking into the other two, instead. He can’t let his bias interfere with the case.

“You got everything you need?” Hank asks him.

Connor takes one last trip around the room, scanning thoroughly for anything he might have missed, and he’s satisfied with his analysis. “I think so. We will need access to the guestlist and any camera footage that was recorded last night through to this morning, but other than that, we can hand it over to forensics.”

The two of them head back downstairs. They seek out Jolene, who allows Connor to download the guestlist from the front desk’s computer and agrees to have security send the camera feed to the precinct as soon as possible.

As they leave the museum to head back to the station, Connor runs more checks on the other two victims, searching for more possible motives. Nothing is evident from first glance; Connor just keeps returning to Stacey Hollins’ employment history.

He wonders what kind of person she was, wonders if she was involved in something Connor never came across during the investigation. Privately and fleetingly, he wonders if he’ll sympathise with her killer’s motives.

* * *

By the time they get back to the precinct, Victor and Detective Reed have left on a job and Connor is once again forced to tell himself that there is absolutely no reason to worry about his brother. He throws himself into helping Hank report their findings at the museum and then continuing to look through Rosales’ contacts.

When Victor and Detective Reed do return, Connor is blindsighted by the sudden and apparent change in both of them.

During the past two months, Connor discovered that the detective had reason to miss Victor, too. Connor still hasn’t had much opportunity to speak with him one on one, and had assumed from an outside, distanced perspective that Detective Reed would be indifferent to Victor's absence at best, but was proven wrong. Instead, Connor found him to be accomodating in the matter of preserving Victor’s desk, and even hopeful in his suggestion that Elijah Kamski could help, once Victor returned.

So, he hadn’t anticipated any problems with the two of them being partners again, but this goes beyond that.

The two of them walk in with a newfound lightness between them. They’re so close that their arms nearly brush against each other, and that’s even without the thickness of Victor’s CyberLife jacket, which he has draped over an arm.

They arrive at their desks and sit down, continuing to casually and comfortably talk as they do. Victor is a little less stiff, a little less unemotional. A little more deviant.

Connor smiles and returns his gaze to his computer monitor.

Of all the possible outcomes upon finding his brother again, this is the best one, Connor thinks. They can truly move on now, they can put the past behind them.

“Haven’t seen Reed look so personable in years,” Hank mutters.

Connor looks up at him and sees that he, too, is watching the other side of the bullpen.

“He would probably say the same thing about me, though,” he adds.

“I’ve been a good influence on you,” Connor says.

Hank huffs a quiet laugh as he turns back to his computer. “Two way street, son.”

Connor wouldn’t deny it, even if Hank is only joking. With some time for self-reflection and a growing friendship with Markus - whose father is human - Connor has been able to categorise his own relationship with Hank. He has been able to recognise that Hank is as much his family as Victor is, human or not. Hank has supported Connor through every step of his deviancy, has opened his home to Connor, and opened himself to Connor, too, like the October morning they spent in the backyard with Sumo while Hank told Connor about Cole.

“Yes, I suppose you’re right, just this once,” Connor says with pretend haughtiness.

“Asshole,” Hank says.

Connor smirks. “I wonder where I learned that from? Two way street, you said?”

“Christ,” Hank curses, but there’s absolutely no heat to it. “You only give me credit when it’s beneficial to you, huh?”

“I’m sure I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Uh huh.”

Connor spends the rest of the day in a better mood than he remembers being in for a long time. He occasionally glances over at Victor when he and Detective Reed are in the bullpen, but he no longer feels such anxiety when they’re out of sight, and by the end of the day, Connor is feeling like he could get used to this. He could get used to spending his days working with both his father and his brother, solving cases and living their lives for themselves. There’s no reason it can’t be this way, now.

His good mood becomes slightly quashed at the end of the day when he, Hank, and Victor leave the station.

Once the initial panic had subsided, human media surrounding the android revolution returned just as strong as it was before the evacuation. There have been numerous replays and analyses of Markus' speeches and protests, as well as the footage of Connor showing up to Hart Plaza with hundreds of androids at his back. All the leaders of Jericho have had private details of their lives exposed to the public. Every meeting, talk, and social event they attend comes with a media buzz attached. Markus gets the brunt of it, but Connor still receives his fair share of it whenever he makes an appearance or some ridiculous speculation gets around.

Reporters across the street from the precinct on this particular day must mean that word of Victor's return to the DPD has caught wind. The public had been aware of there being two androids working the deviancy case, and Connor has weathered rude and uncomfortable questions about Victor over the past two months.

Victor stiffens at the sight of the humans with their cameras, and Connor reaches for his elbow, grasping onto him in an attempt to ground him.

Many of the faces in the group are ones Connor recognises, some from Hart Plaza, and some from other events. A couple are new, but he isn’t close enough to scan, and ultimately, they all annoy him equally. He doesn’t want anyone asking Victor about where he has been, about whether or not he’s a deviant, or if he regrets his actions from last year.

“Ignore them,” Hank says from Victor’s other side. Mirroring Connor, he puts a hand on Victor’s back as he directs them towards the parking lot.

Victor does not ignore them. His fists clench as a camera light flashes in their direction.

The skin of Connor’s hand around Victor’s elbow automatically retracts, connecting with him. Very briefly, he feels Victor’s disquiet at being inspected by strangers and the possibility of people becoming invasively interested in his reappearance before the feelings are quelled by his programming.

It isn’t good timing, but Connor is curious, determined, and the opportunity is there. He tries to latch onto Victor’s fading emotions, following them to wherever they go when they’re taken from him. If Connor holds on long enough, maybe he could find them. Not just the muffled echoes of Victor’s emotions, but the place they’re echoing from.

Searching deep, Connor finally finds what he’s looking for. Their interfaces may not get blocked the way Victor’s interfaces with Karoline and Markus did, but there is a point at which Connor can go no further. He’s cut off abruptly, slamming into the wall of Victor’s code.

It’s unsettling, draining. It feels _cold_.

Instinctively, Connor mentally pulls back, then becomes frustrated with himself for reacting so strongly. He won’t learn anything if he gives into the discomfort. Victor doesn't even have the choice of shying away from it, it’s inside of him.

“Connor?” Victor asks, brows furrowed in worry.

They’ve reached Hank’s car and Connor uses it as an excuse for his behaviour by moving around to the other side. He gives Victor a reassuring smile as they climb into the backseat together.

Before Victor can draw attention back to the interface, Connor speaks. “I talked to Chloe, today. Elijah Kamski can take a look at your code and try to find whatever is keeping you from deviating. What do you think?”

While Victor considers it, his LED flickers and spins yellow.

Like that November night at the station, right before Connor deviated, he seems to be struggling to process something through the constraints of his code. Connor gives him a moment, silently encouraging.

“I would be interested in meeting CyberLife’s founder,” Victor finally says.

It isn’t a direct answer to the question, but a safe, neutral response, one that his programming can’t mangle or bury. It’s enough for Connor to understand what’s going unsaid.

“We’ll arrange something, then,” Connor says.

Most of the reporters are already dispersing by the time Hank pulls the car out onto the street, except for a woman still giving a segment to her cameraperson and a man who has leant up against the nearby bus stop enclosure for a smoke, his camcorder hanging from a strap around his neck.

At least none of them tried to get closer to ask any questions. Victor’s focus seems to have turned to the prospect of seeing Elijah Kamski, too, his eyes unfocused on the back of Hank’s seat instead of the sidewalk.

All in all, the day is far from ruined, and Connor relaxes again. The media will lose interest - they always end up more concerned with Markus and sometimes North, anyway.

In the meantime, they’ll see Kamski, and hopefully find a way to remove this one last barrier holding Victor back.


	4. Chapter 4

Victor and Gavin pull the car to a stop in a corner store parking lot, across the junction from a run-down duplex. No one is paying the rent for the place – no one has been paying the rent for a couple of years. It has been five months since the landlord passed away and the building is officially owned by the state.

They’re looking for a woman named Cleo. No other information is known; Tali hasn’t heard much about the dealer herself, but the location is more than enough to get them pointed in the right direction. If Tali’s information is good – and Victor thinks it must be, with the confidence Gavin has in her – there should be people coming and going, eventually. They just need to catch Cleo in the act, and the case can advance.

They head for the building. Inside, the entranceway and the staircase leading up to the second apartment are in disarray, the floor smudged thoroughly with dirt and the plaster of the walls cracked and discoloured. In the corner behind the stairs, garbage and unwanted household items have been dumped and left, gathering dust.

They step up to the door of the first apartment. It isn’t just unlocked, the lock is entirely broken, hanging uselessly off the front of the door in a mangled mess.

Victor slowly pushes the door open, taking the lead into the apartment. He doesn’t hear any noise coming from inside, but they can’t be too cautious.

The doorway opens into a hallway, with the kitchen ahead, the living room to the right, and bedrooms to the left. The place is just as messy as the staircase outside, and dark except for the afternoon light coming in through the windows. The floors are gritty under Victor’s boots and the paint on the walls is chipping and peeling.

Victor doesn’t immediately spot any danger. Ahead, the kitchen is empty, but there is evidence of people having been around; old food packages and various drug delivery devices from pipes to syringes are scattered on the countertops. There is still no sound or movement from the visible parts of the house. Determining that it’s safe, he steps inside and allows Gavin to follow right after him. Together, they turn into the living room.

Against the back wall of the otherwise empty room, there’s a thin, ratty mattress on the floor, and a person laying on top of it, limp and unmoving. There’s red residue on his lips and track marks on the insides of his arms.

“Shit,” Gavin says, starting forward.

Victor scans him, both for his identity and his vitals. “Callum Brooks, twenty-five years old. He’s alive, but his heart rate is slow and faint.”

Gavin crouches down over the man, touching two fingers to his pulse to double check. He sighs heavily. “It sure is. Call an ambulance.”

With a nod, Victor places the call. “Estimated time of arrival is twelve minutes. I’ll clear the other rooms.”

“Yeah, thanks,” Gavin says.

He remains by Brooks while Victor returns to the hallway that leads to the back, where there’s a bathroom and two small bedrooms. The bathroom is in a similar state as the kitchen. Victor can see the remains of a powdered drug that must have been snorted off the counter beside the sink.

Moving on, he pushes open the door to one of the bedrooms, expecting more of the same.

The room is full of garbage bags and beat-up cardboard boxes. Victor assumes the most recent tenants of the apartment might have chosen to leave some of their belongings behind. He leans down to open the closest box.

He comes face to face with a white and grey metalloid skull, disconnected from its torso and balanced on top of several other android limbs. The eyes have been removed from the sockets, and behind the holes, the skull appears empty.

Picking the head up, Victor turns it and looks inside through the hole at the neck. Sure enough, the processor is missing and all the wires and mechanical parts that would have connected it to the other head components and the rest of the body are missing. When he scans, he finds no thirium on the skull, or anywhere else in the room.

Victor isn’t quite sure what to make of it. He sets the head down on the floor and looks through the rest of the box, finding four arms and legs each. One of the arms doesn’t match any of the others and the legs come in two sets. He’s looking at odd body parts for at least two androids. They’re all empty of anything that would make them functional.

Someone is either planning to piece androids together, or they have taken androids apart. From the incompatible pieces, the lack of biocomponents, and the careless way they have been dumped in an abandoned apartment where there are no assembly tools, Victor thinks it’s likely to be the latter.

Androids are people with rights, now, and deactivating them is murder.

He looks down at the head he set on the floor and wonders if they were alive, once. Maybe the bodies have been here since before early November. Maybe they’ve only been here a couple of weeks. Maybe it doesn’t matter.

Victor feels – uncomfortable. He rubs one of his hands over the back of his other wrist just to have something to do with them. He glances around the room again, at all the other boxes and the garbage bags.

He should check more, gather more information. This goes beyond a drug bust, this is a potential murder crime scene.

Pulling his hands apart, he steps up to one of the garbage bags and pulls back the twisted plastic.  

It’s entirely full of disconnected heads. Victor’s attention is drawn to the empty sockets, looking into the dark void behind them, and starts to feel unsettled again.

Shaking his head, he forcibly tears his gaze away from the two gaps where eyes should be and logs the serial number printed along the cheek. He moves the head to the side and seeks out more serial numbers.

AP700 #904 707 618

AP700 #129 505 370

AP700 #511 175 610

They’re all AP700s. Victor checks the one on the ground again. AP700. It can’t be a coincidence. If the rest of the boxes and bags are similarly filled, there could be a couple dozen dismembered units, and double that if the second bedroom is being used for the same purpose.

He backs out of the room to check the other one, and finds it just as full of dismembered bodies, all of them AP700s. Victor can’t conceive of how someone got their hands on so many, or how it has gone unnoticed, especially if they were killed after the laws were changed.

For the time being, Victor decides to return to Gavin in the living room. The EMT will be arriving in less than a couple of minutes, and then they can discuss the bodies once they have privacy.

Gavin hasn’t moved from his spot by Brooks, his eyes cast down at the man’s chest, which is still rising and falling in a slow, deep pattern. He doesn’t look up until Victor stops next to him.

“Find anything?” he asks.

“It can wait until after Mr. Brooks has been helped off the premises.”

“Cool,” Gavin says, sighing. “Love the sound of that.”

They wait in silence for a couple of minutes until Victor hears the sound of a vehicle approaching, coming to a stop in front of the building. He walks back out to the front door to gesture in the EMTs, one of which is human and the other of which is an android, only recognisable from the face sculpt, as she has no LED.

Victor waits in the hall to stay out of their way, and Gavin joins him after having a quick word with them. It isn’t until they’ve taken a still-unconscious Brooks out of the apartment and Victor hears the ambulance starting back up that he fills Gavin in.

“I discovered the disconnected bodies of at least fifty AP700 androids stashed between the two bedrooms,” he says.

“Fifty?” Gavin repeats, jerking in shock. “Disconnected?”

“Each individual limb separated from the torso,” Victor answers. “For easier transport more so than anything else, judging by the way they’re packaged. They weren’t pulled apart here, there’s no thirium.”

Gavin grimaces and pinches the bridge of his nose. “That’s fucked up and totally not what I signed up for, today. Alright. It’s gonna have to wait. The dealer might know about it, so we wait for her to show and hope the ambulance didn’t blow our cover.”

Victor nods his agreement. There’s still a chance that Cleo will stop by as the day grows late, planning to meet with Brooks or another buyer.

“Let’s head back to the car,” Gavin says.

* * *

 An hour and twenty-seven minutes pass by with no activity at the duplex, and an hour and twenty-five of them are spent in silence. It has been raining for the most recent twelve minutes, mottling the snow at the side of the road and likely setting the city up to be covered in ice by the next morning. The sun has set and the light from the streetlamps glints off the drops of water rolling down the windshield. Aside from their reason to be on this particular street, watching this particular duplex, the calm and quiet evening is oddly peaceful.

Victor has never been on a stake out before. It’s little more than sitting and waiting for the action, but it doesn’t agitate him the way he used to feel agitated when needing to wait at the station during Gavin’s off hours. The itch to follow any available thread of the investigation has abated, for the time being.

He answers to the DPD instead of CyberLife, now. He has a job and an assignment, instead of strict and stifling orders. Failing will not result in his deactivation. Failing would still have consequences, but not like before, and Victor doesn’t anticipate him and Gavin failing, anyway. He’s more at ease in the hush of Gavin’s car, watching for their target to appear, than he ever was at the station during night shift.

At an hour and thirty-two minutes, a young, built man approaches the building, glancing up and down the street as he walks to the front door and slips inside.

“You got him logged?” Gavin asks.

“We’re too far away for an identity scan, but I have a decent enough image for recognition software, if we lose him.”

“Good enough. Cleo’s bound to be on her way, if she’s got a customer waiting.”

Rather than falling into silence once again, Gavin surprises Victor by speaking up only a minute later. Gavin has surprised him a lot, ever since they first met months ago.

“Seems like you’re taking well to… y’know, everything,” Gavin says.

Victor supposes he is. The routine isn’t altogether different from how it was before. He’s familiar with the station and the people. He and Gavin solved a quick and simple theft case during the morning before seeking out the potential drug den, and it had been just as rewarding as anything they did for the deviant case.

“I am,” Victor says. “The transition has been straightforward.”

Gavin nods slowly. Forty-eight minutes ago, he slid down in his seat a little, taking a more comfortable position. The posture isn’t good for his back. His eyes are trained on the alley in between the duplex and the next property over, watching for someone to emerge and one of his arms is laid against the base of the window, balanced on the curve of the door, his fingers tapping against the padding.

“Do you like it? Working for the DPD, I mean,” Gavin asks.

The answer comes to Victor without a thought. Of course he likes it; police work is what he’s programmed for, it’s his purpose, his function. Gavin knows this. They’ve worked together plenty.

If Gavin knows this, but he’s still asking, he must assume there can be a discrepancy between Victor’s programming and what he likes. Victor hadn’t considered that a possibility. When Connor told him that he could continue working at the DPD, he latched onto it, felt it was his only option.

But he has data – data from the deviancy case – that suggests a discrepancy is not only possible, but likely. Deviation and the revolution were built upon this discrepancy. Victor just hadn’t stopped to think about what that could mean for him.

Gavin turns to look at him, but he doesn’t say anything, doesn’t prompt Victor to answer quickly. Victor doesn’t know Gavin to be a patient person, but in this moment, he appears willing to wait.

Connor is a deviant and still chooses to work at the DPD, but he is unique in this fashion, the only example Victor has of a deviant who finds fulfillment in their programmed purpose. Victor could be the same, or he could be like one of the many others, just without the ability to recognise it.

“I don’t know. I think I do, but…” Victor trails off, unsure.

“S’alright,” Gavin says. “Some humans take years to figure out what they want to do with their lives, you know?”

Victor really hopes it doesn’t take him that long to unlock all the parts of himself that CyberLife tried to bury. It’s still so hard to access and parse his own feelings, but he knows they’re there and he knows he’s _frustrated_.

“Did you always know you wanted to be a detective?” Victor asks.

“Since I was a teenager. But all kids have harebrained ideas of what they’re going to be when they grow up. When I was eight, I wanted nothing more than to be a nurse like my mom was.”

Gavin has never spoken of his mother before, has barely ever talked about himself at all. The only thing Victor knows about his past is that he shares a parent with Elijah Kamski, and he has been very successful at the DPD. There are still so many blank parts of Gavin’s life that Victor has no information about.

His mother being a nurse makes sense. Victor brings up the profile he started putting together on Gavin last September, placing particular note on the detective’s reaction to the MC500 medical android, about his intuitiveness that Victor hadn’t been able to follow. He still has the camera footage from the hospital logged in his system and has reviewed it more times than necessary in search of the details that tipped Gavin off.

Victor had seen an android deviating and attacking a human, an android who was dangerous to innocent humans. Gavin had seen something else. It hadn’t been clear to Victor until after their stop to the Thompson residence that Gavin had known all along that the android was trying to protect the child.

This adds yet another layer. Maybe Gavin saw some of his mother in a medical android who defended a young boy with a broken arm.

“Your mother?” Victor prompts, interested in whatever Gavin is willing to tell him.

“Yeah. You have access to huge databases, right?”

“Yes,” Victor says.

Gavin turns away from him again, eyes trained back on the street. “Look up Marisela Reed. Might be something about her, who knows.”

Victor searches, and something does pop up.

Marisela Reed  
DOB: 4/7/1982  
DOD: 1/29/2019  
Criminal Record: None

Gavin was only sixteen years old when she died. The anniversary is only a couple of weeks away. Victor doesn’t know what it’s like to have a parent, or what it’s like to lose a parent, but he does know what it’s like to almost lose a – lose a brother.

“What was she like?” Victor asks.

“Strong,” Gavin says, his voice soft. He gives a little shrug like he’s trying to downplay his feelings on the matter. “She was a single mom, she had to be. But that was just her way, with or without me. Her job was saving people’s lives.”

He must miss her. She must have been the only real family he had, judging from the way he kept his relationship to Elijah Kamski quiet for years.

“I’m sorry,” Victor says.

“Thanks.” Gavin sighs, shifting a little lower in his seat and crossing his arms over his chest. “But anyway… if being a detective works for you, that’s cool, and if it doesn’t, that’s fine, too.”

For now, Victor doesn’t see anything changing. He’s still bound by his programming, and whether or not he truly wants to work at the DPD is the least of his worries compared to the other effects of his code.

“I’m content with how things are,” he says.

He’s content with his job, and his work partner. However, this brings up another aspect of Victor’s profile on Gavin: his extreme reluctance to take a permanent partner. In the files Victor went through about Gavin’s work history, he only ever encountered one time when Gavin had an assigned partner, and it was during the early days, when he was still an officer. For a couple of years, Gavin’s reports are often co-signed by an M. Cooper, but they disappeared some time prior to Gavin’s promotion to detective, after which no partnership ever became official. He only ever occasionally worked with Detective Chen and Officer Miller.

Asking Gavin about it may not be the best course of action. On the other hand, he has been much more personable and forthcoming of late. Curiosity urges Victor on.

“You don’t mind having me as a partner?”

It isn’t exactly the question he meant to ask, but it’s close enough.

Gavin shakes his head, glancing over at him again. “No, I don’t. If I did, I wouldn’t have told Fowler we could work together again.”

This shouldn’t be surprising – Victor recalls Gavin’s nervousness during their reunion, recalls his friendly gestures, his gentler words and tone – and yet, Victor still feels _something_ about having it confirmed. He can’t name the feeling, can’t properly examine it, but he thinks it’s good.

“And, uh, about that…” Gavin continues. He bites his lip, awkward like he was when they talked in the break room. “I wanted to say... Well, what it comes down to, I guess, is I’m sorry.”

Victor blinks. “Sorry?” he repeats.

He can’t even fathom what Gavin is apologising for; the two of them have gotten along fine since becoming partners for the second time, to the point where Victor is almost more startled by Gavin’s shift in attitude towards him than he is about waking up to the completely changed landscape of Detroit.

Gavin huffs a short breath. “Yeah, I deserve that. I mean it, though.”

“No, I just don’t see why you feel the need to apologise,” Victor says, frowning at him.

“What? Seriously?” Gavin says. “I was a prick to you for almost three months straight.”

That isn't exactly how Victor interprets it. Their relationship had been strained and a source of frustration and confusion, but it had been complicated circumstances, and far from one-sided.

“I choked you and knocked you out,” Victor says bluntly. “You were trying to get through to me and I hurt you.”

Gavin unconsciously lifts a hand and rubs it over the back of his neck. “I asked for it, though. Not just then, but the entire time. You know better than anyone that I don’t play well with others, that I can be a fucking asshole. And anyway, you were… stuck, or whatever. It’s not your fault.”

“I was not deterred by your attitude,” Victor says. “It took me time to understand it, but it did not cause me to dislike you.”

“You must have the patience of a saint.”

“You were- I just-” Victor grimaces, face screwing up in annoyance when the words start to fail him.

It would be so much easier if he could just interface with Gavin, like he can with Connor. Connor is able to feel what Victor can’t say, but Gavin is a human, and he won’t understand unless Victor finds the right words or the right actions to get his thoughts across.

Victor has been feeling less restrained since waking up sixty-three days into a future without CyberLife to control him, but there are still limits, there is still a barrier between him and the most human parts of him.

“You’re an impressive detective,” Victor says. That’s a fact. That’s simple. Anyone with enough knowledge of Gavin’s past cases would draw the same conclusion.

“Uh, thanks,” Gavin says, brows furrowed.

Neither of them is doing a very good job of watching the duplex, but Victor pushes that thought aside. The street is calm and he’s sure he’ll notice movement if that changes, regardless of his and Gavin’s divided attention.

“Your intuitions are valuable. Being your partner could have been… lucrative,” he continues carefully. “Now that we are working outside the constraints of CyberLife’s objectives, things will be better, I think. They already have been.”

“Yeah,” Gavin agrees, giving him a considering look. “Shit was fucked, before.”

Victor can’t say as much, and certainly wouldn’t do it in such vulgar words, but he privately agrees. “I had two objectives at the beginning of the deviancy case. A primary and a secondary. The first was to stop deviancy, the second was to work alongside the DPD as well as possible without impacting the first objective. I… I would have liked to accomplish my secondary objective.”

He would have liked to accomplish his secondary objective at the expense of the first objective. He would have liked to remain on the same side of the fight as Connor. He would have liked things to go so much differently.

“Hey,” Gavin says, drawing Victor’s attention over to him. His gaze is the most open Victor has ever seen it. There’s a softness to his expression that Victor never would have thought possible. “I see what you’re saying. You don’t have to deal with that bullshit anymore, okay?”

Victor nods. He’s grateful for the support from both Gavin and Connor, though he still isn’t entirely sure what he has done to earn it from Gavin.

“Even if you can’t put it into straight words, if you have to talk around some kind of… programming firewall or whatever the fuck, I’ll figure it out,” Gavin adds. “Like you said, I’m a pretty good detective.”

He grins cheekily, and Victor feels warm.

“Thank you, Gavin,” Victor says, smiling gently in return.

“Connor’s already suggested seeing Elijah, right?”

“He mentioned the possibility yesterday.”

“You going to do it?”

“Yes. This weekend.”

“Good. I’m sure he can figure something out. People say the guy’s a genius, so,” he says, shrugging but unable to stop himself from chuckling.

Terrible jokes aside, Victor is definitely anticipating it. If Victor can’t deviate the same way as Connor and the others, the original inventor of androids has the best chance of figuring out why.

Movement in the corner of his eye catches his attention, cutting the conversation short.

Ahead, a blond woman who looks to be in her early thirties is walking up the street towards the duplex. She has a backpack slung over one of her shoulders, which she hefts higher by one of the straps as she pushes her way inside the building.

“Our target,” Victor says.

“Sure is. Let’s go.”

Gavin is already throwing his car door open and stepping out. Victor follows after him, keeping his eyes forward as he does to watch the woman disappear from sight, gone further into the apartment.

The two of them hurry across the street.

“Hallway’s too open,” Gavin says as he draws his gun. “Back to back. I’ve got the living room side.”

Victor nods.

Moving quietly, they step through the door into the apartment, each turning in the opposite direction. There’s no one in the kitchen and the hallway is clear.

A low voice sounds from the living room. “Didn’t expect you around.”

“Boss said you- what was that?”

“Huh?”

Both Gavin and Victor turn into the room. The presumed dealer and the man from earlier are there, the woman now carrying her backpack in her hand and the man leaning back against the wall.

Victor has just enough time to scan them before they all start to move. The woman – Cleo Matheson, 32 years old, no criminal record – is loosening her grip on her backpack handle, prepared to drop it like dead weight. The man – Ross Bennett, 29 years old, three accounts of drug possession and one account of assault causing bodily harm – has shifted forward on his feet, away from the wall and ready for action. His eyes are dilated and trained right on Victor with an intense focus.

“DPD, put your hands in the air!” Gavin yells.

Bennett ignores his words, ignores him completely. He starts forward, still only looking at Victor.

The backpack finally falls free of Cleo’s grip, slumping over on the ground and spilling several plastic packets of crystallised Red Ice.

“Stop!” Gavin warns Bennett.

Bennett does not stop. Victor knows the side effects of Red Ice, and he can see from Bennett’s blown, glossy eyes that he’s used recently. He isn’t strung out and weak like Callum Brooks suffering from withdrawal, he isn’t completely sober and alert like Cleo Matheson, he’s high and dangerous. He doesn’t care if an officer of the law is yelling at him to stop, he isn’t going to stop.

Bennett pulls back a fist, Victor raises an arm to deflect it, and Gavin points his pistol at the man instead of Cleo.

She takes the opportunity and bolts forward, circling around them to get at the hallway.

Victor knocks Bennett’s fist to the side. He pivots with the movement, slamming his opposite shoulder into Bennett’s chest, knocking him back and sending him reeling.

“Go after her,” Victor says. “I’ve got this.”

Gavin doesn’t waste any time. He turns around and hurries after the dealer, who has wrenched the front door of the apartment open and escaped into the entrance of the building.

Victor stalks towards Bennett, considering the best way to take him down. Red Ice puts its users into a rage, makes them fight harder, even beyond reason. Victor is still stronger, but he needs to account for the man’s recklessness.

Instead of making a fist again, Bennett reaches into the pocket on the inside of his jacket and draws a small revolver handgun.

Without bothering to preconstruct the path first, Victor darts across the last distance between them. As Bennett’s finger pushes down on the trigger, Victor grabs his arm with both hands, one on the wrist and the other at the elbow, manipulating it to point up into the ceiling. The crack of the gun firing is loud in his audio processors.

Victor tightens his hand around Bennett’s wrist, straining the bone. Bennett snarls at him, eyes glazed, like a rabid animal.

Removing his hand from Bennett’s elbow, Victor grabs the gun instead, disarming him forcibly. Even while high on Red Ice, Bennett’s adrenaline rush isn’t enough to help him resist an android built for combat. Victor releases Bennett’s wrist, only to curl his fingers into a fist and punch the man in the face, not hard enough to knock him out, but enough that he careens back, disoriented.

Victor pops the cylinder of the revolver to the side, pours the bullets out into his palm, and then drops them and the empty gun to the ground.

Bennett has collected himself, but his stance is starting to look unsteady. Either Victor’s punch affected Bennett more than he intended, or he’s starting to come down from his high, the Red Ice burning bright and dying fast.

Lunging, Bennett shoves both his arms at Victor’s chest. Victor dodges to the side and then trips up one of Bennett’s legs.

Bennett loses his balance and falls face first to the ground with a grunt. Victor plants his feet on either side of Bennett’s waist, crouches down, and pulls both his arms behind his back, holding them there with one hand. He uses the other to pat Bennett down, in search of weapons.

“Get the fuck off me, fucker!” Bennett yells at him, squirming against the floor. Victor tightens his hand around the man’s wrists and recites his Miranda rights.

There’s nothing on him but some loose change and a small box in his coat pocket.

It’s a matchbox. A matchbox that Victor is sure he has seen before.

It only takes his system a second and a half to match it against his memory logs, bringing up the day he and Gavin investigated an AP700 at the CyberLife store. Afterwards, in the evidence room, their argument had been interrupted by Detective Chen bringing Stanley Whittaker’s personal effects down to the basement. Gavin had paid particular attention to the box of matches.

It’s the same brand, the cardboard old and scuffed with a painted label on the front. People don’t typically carry matches around with them, when a lighter would be more convenient.  

The sound of rushed footsteps echoes from the stairwell outside of the apartment, and then Gavin bursts back into the room. He takes in the sight of Victor pinning Bennett down and then finds the gun and discarded bullets on the floor before letting out a long breath, relaxing.

“Fuck’s sake,” he curses, breath strained. “Heard the shot. Didn’t know he had a gun.”

Victor slips the matchbox into his own pocket. “It was no problem,” he says.

Gavin comes over to help him haul Bennett up from the ground, both of them keeping hold of one arm. Bennett struggles between them, but his efforts have grown weaker still.

“I called it in once I got Cleo sorted, forensics will take care of the evidence. Let’s go.”

Together, they pull Bennett along, outside and across the street to the parking lot.

Cleo is cuffed in the back of the car, a stormy look on her face. She scoffs, harsh and annoyed, at the sight of Bennett incapacitated.

When they get him zip tied and in the car beside her, Bennett turns on her, speaking through gritted teeth. “They’re here for you, not me. This is your fault.”

“Shut the fuck up, Ross,” she snaps. “Keep your fucking mouth shut, alright?”

“Don’t tell me what to do, bitch!”

“Hey!” Gavin interrupts them from the driver’s seat. “You’re giving me a goddamn headache, so tone it down.”

The two of them look away from each other in a huff, but neither speaks.

The drive back to the precinct is tense and it continues to rain all the way there, but Victor doesn’t mind the dreary atmosphere; his and Gavin’s progress on the Red Ice case and their opportunity to talk with each other has put him in what he can only call a good mood, even with the brief violence that happened in between. After their conversation, he is feeling even more optimistic about their future partnership.

He does end up placing his hand down over his pants pocket where the matchbox is secured, thumb pressed to the long edge of it as he ponders its origin, but he doesn’t have enough information to theorise.

At the station, they put Bennett in a holding cell and take Cleo straight to the interrogation room, grabbing the Red Ice case file on the way. After Cleo is settled in and cuffed to the table, Gavin leaves the file on the opposite side of the table and then they go back out to the observation room.

Victor knows the only thing they should be discussing is their approach to the interrogation, but he finds that his curiosity is unyielding and his hand goes into his pocket, circling around the box of matches.

“I found something at the scene,” he says. The box is evidence. It’ll get packed up like the identical box Whittaker had on him, which makes it relevant enough.

“Yeah?”

Victor pulls the box out and shows it to Gavin.

Gavin’s jaw clenches. The rest of his face remains completely passive, like he’s intentionally keeping it calm, unemotional.

“So what? It’s just a box of matches.”

“It’s odd, isn’t it?” Victor argues. “You and Detective Chen said as much when Whittaker had the same one.”

Gavin’s eyes dart up from the box to latch onto Victor’s. “You remember that shit? It’s nothing important.”

Victor doesn’t bother reminding him that as an android, his memory is perfect regardless of importance. He remembers the matchbox, and he remembers the reaction it sparked. “It caught your eye. This means something to you.”

“That what you think, huh?” Gavin snaps, expression turning annoyed. He snatches the matchbox away from Victor, pushing on one side with his thumb to slide it out of the cover. “It’s nothing. It’s just a fucking box of-”

He cuts himself off abruptly when a folded piece of thick paper pops free from the containment of the small box.

In his shock, he forgets to school his features. He looks shaken, scared. Victor watches intently as Gavin picks the paper up, tosses the empty box away onto the observation room table, and then carefully pulls the paper’s corners apart.

It’s a picture, printed on photo paper. Victor is surprised to find his own face looking back at him, creased in a grid pattern from being folded up. The outside of the station is in the background. On one side of him, Lieutenant Anderson’s arm disappears behind his back and on the other, Connor’s hand is wrapped around his elbow, his fingers turning white. It’s easily recognisable from the previous evening, when the three of them left the station.

“Oh, fuck,” Gavin says faintly, like the breath has been stolen from his lungs.

“What does it mean?” Victor asks.

Gavin crumples the picture in his fist and throws it at the table to land next to the box and then brings a hand up to rub tiredly at his face before speaking. “It’s… it’s someone I put away. It’s been ten years. He must be out.”

That would have been right before Gavin’s promotion to detective. It might be the _reason_ for the promotion.

“Who?”

Gavin looks uncharacteristically skittish, and he avoids Victor’s eyes. When he speaks, the words come out strained.

“Look, I… don’t want to fucking talk about it just yet. You don’t have to worry about it, I’ll go to Fowler and make a report. I won’t let this blow back on you more than it already has, nothing’s going to happen. But let’s just… focus on one thing at a time.”

Curiosity still gnaws at Victor, but it’s obvious that this has spooked Gavin and he needs time to process, so he nods and concedes.

He can’t say he’s overly concerned, at least not for himself. He spends all of his time in the presence of at least one detective or lieutenant, and if Bennett’s attack had been an attempt at something, it hadn’t been an effective attempt in the slightest. With CyberLife out of the picture, there are few things that could hurt Victor.

For Gavin, however, Victor wishes he knew how to be reassuring. He wishes he had access to the right words. The best he can do is repeat Gavin’s words back to him and hope Gavin understands the extent of it.

“Nothing will happen to you either, Gavin,” he says. Gavin looks up again, still troubled but regarding Victor with careful interest. “We’re partners. I won’t let anything happen to you.”

Gavin’s eyes widen a fraction and his lips part but words seem to fail him. That’s something Victor understands perfectly well.

“For now, let’s question Ms. Matheson,” he says.

With a nod, Gavin puts himself back together, back straightening and face becoming neutral, unbothered. Within seconds, he looks his usual self, like nothing happened. He looks through the one-way mirror at the dealer, furrowing his brow in thought.

“Cleo Matheson… any priors?”

“No, no criminal record.”

“Hm. Name sounds familiar,” Gavin says. He shrugs, moving on. “Alright, want to go in together or trade off?” he asks.

Victor follows his line of sight into the interrogation room, considering the woman waiting for them. “Trade off. When she told Bennett to stay quiet, I think that was more than just agitation. Being made to believe that one of us is speaking with Bennett might incite something.”

“Good call,” Gavin says. “I’ll start, then.”

He steps into the room while Victor sits down to watch. The photo and matchbox are still on the table, and he takes the time to fold the picture back up and replace it inside the box, the way it was when he found it on Bennett. Like this, it really does look like any ordinary matchbox, instead of something with the power to shake someone Victor has never seen so shaken. Victor has seen Gavin angry, has seen him annoyed, and disgusted, and even horrified, but not for himself.

Victor doesn’t recall any old reports of Gavin’s that seem linked to this. They’re either restricted or filed in someone else’s name, since Gavin was only an officer at the time. He’s torn between wanting to know more and wanting to give Gavin his space and privacy.

The inclusion of the photograph means Victor is involved, and it will need to be discussed in time. Victor can wait until then.

In the interrogation room, Gavin has sat down across from Cleo, resting his arms on the table between them.

“Ms. Matheson, you were caught in possession of Red Ice with intent to sell. You could be looking at twenty months, just for that.”

Cleo has her hands laid flat on the table and her eyes trained down at the chain linking them together.

“But that number can be negotiated,” Gavin continues. “If you answer some questions for us.”

She doesn’t say anything.

“Did you make the Red Ice yourself?” Gavin asks.

No reaction.

This isn’t the first time Victor has watched Gavin interrogate someone uncooperative. Last time, Gavin figured out exactly what to say to get the android talking.

“You know, your pal is facing even more time, for assault with a deadly weapon against an officer of the law. You both have the opportunity to come out ahead, here. You really going to let him take that chance from you?”

Cleo’s eyes narrow and her upper lip twitches like she means to sneer, but she keeps herself under control, remaining quiet.

“Seems to me that the two of you aren’t very friendly. Why hold back for his sake?” Gavin asks.

She isn’t swayed.

“Alright,” Gavin says. “I’m just going to keep asking you questions, and you stop me if there’s something you can answer. Then we’ll see about shortening that sentence.”

He sits back and opens the case file, taking out three mugshots and laying them out for Cleo to look at.

“Did you sell Red Ice to any of these people?”

Cleo manages to not even glance at them instinctually, either reigning herself in or truly not caring to look. Gavin leaves the pictures in front of her even as he continues on, but she steadfastly avoids them.

“Can you tell me about the android bodies dumped inside the duplex? If _that_ gets pinned on you, you’ll get a lot more than twenty months.”

Even in the face of multiple murder charges, Cleo doesn’t react or speak, not to defend herself or deny her involvement. She doesn’t ask for a lawyer. She just sits there and takes the questions as they come, like she doesn’t care what happens next.

Gavin frowns, obviously growing frustrated.

“Does the name Callum Brooks ring any bells?” he asks. “Because we found him earlier today, so strung out he may not make it the night. What do you think of that, huh? Do you care if your product kills off your customers?”

The only thing Cleo does is close her eyes and take a slow, deep breath.

Gavin shakes his head and stands up, pushing his chair back in with much more noise than necessary. “Well, the offer only stands until Bennett gives us everything we need. If you change your mind and want in on the action, just, I don’t know, flip off the camera in the corner. It’ll be like our secret handshake.”

He leaves the room, and Cleo makes no move to call him back.

“Fucking _Christ_ ,” Gavin says once the door is shut, massaging his temple. “Tightest lips I’ve ever met with, I’ll give her that.”

Victor stands up with him, once again searching for words of reassurance. “She may feel more forthcoming after a night in custody.”

“Guess we’ll have to see, unless you want to take a crack at her.”

There isn’t a high chance that Victor will be able to do what Gavin couldn’t. Cleo is steadfast in her silence.

Victor shakes his head. “I’ll try in the morning.”

“Let’s get out of here, then. You want a lift to Anderson’s?”

“I would appreciate it,” Victor answers.

“Okay. Gonna put the file away, give Collins the reins for the night shift, and then we’ll head out.”

Victor watches Gavin go and then turns back to look at Cleo through the interrogation room mirror one last time. He isn’t sure what approach would get through to her. They already have ample evidence against her and he doubts she’s trying to protect Bennett, so her refusal to take whatever angle she can is baffling.

Perhaps Connor would know what to do. He is the one more suited to this aspect of the job.

Putting that thought aside, Victor leaves the observation room to find Gavin, ready to go home.


	5. Chapter 5

Old Jericho - the big freighter ship - is still at dock. It has sunk as low as it can go this close to shore, half full of water, and left like a memorial to the dead. A team of androids have been trying to recover bodies from the water and the ship’s interior, but most would rather not return to see the wreckage, and humans have steered clear, sensing that it isn’t their place.

Somewhere on the ship, a body of Victor’s remains, his thirium pump burst open by a bullet Connor aimed at him.

But that isn’t the body Connor is here to see. The recovery team discovered a body that was not there previously, which is how Connor ended up back in a place he would have been happy to leave behind him.

This time, at least, Hank is with him and he’s too focused on the job to think about his short stay on old Jericho last year.

Connor is surprised to find Ivy waiting for them, instead of someone from the recovery team. She nods to Connor as he and Hank approach her at the edge of the dock, gesturing for them to head up the rickety, metal ramp to the deck of the ship.

“Tim was a part of the team reviewing all of CyberLife’s assets,” she explains as she walks with them. “I would like to know what happened to him.”

“When did you last see him?” Connor asks.

“Forty-three hours ago, at CyberLife Tower,” Ivy answers. “I did note that I never saw him yesterday, but we’re all busy. It isn’t unheard of.”

They reach the deck and Connor spots the body ahead, dropped haphazardly on the dark, rusted metal. It looks like it was dumped and left without much thought. As they step closer, Hank makes an unhappy noise in the back of his throat, and Connor concurs. Ivy, too, has a hard expression on her face.

The victim is unclothed and his skin is completely deactivated, showing his bare chassis and all the tampering that has been done to it. The panel over his core is open and entire sections of his plating have been stripped away over his arms and legs, as well as one on the side of his neck.

From these windows, they can see that the android is as stripped from the inside as he is on the outside, completely empty of all parts and components.

There isn’t even a drop of thirium left to sample.

“He’s been… harvested,” Hank says, grimacing.

Connor nods. “This would be overkill, otherwise. The victim would have died long before it got to this point.”

He continues to scan for additional details to fill in what happened, and notices considerable damage to the android’s wrists.

“He was restrained,” he says to Hank. “The force needed to crack the plating like that suggests he was hanging by his wrists for an extended period of time.”

“Easier to pull him apart, like that, I guess,” Hank says. “There isn’t a black market for biocomponents, is there?”

“No,” Ivy says. “There is no reason for such a thing, now that Jericho has complete access to the means of production through CyberLife. We have no shortage of parts and thirium for those who need them.”

There’s nothing else of note about the body. There’s no other damage and no fingerprints and nothing else left on the deck of the ship. Someone was careful and thorough and might have thought no one would bother looking back on the graveyard that old Jericho has become. The killer may have hoped that even if someone did come back, they would assume Tim had been killed during the raid like all the others. The state of his body makes that assumption impossible, but a human may not have understood that.

“That bleak, huh?” Hank asks.

Connor looks over at him, finding that Hank is watching him intently. Hank seems to be able to tell what Connor is thinking just by looking at him, these days.

“The killer left nothing to trace,” Connor says. “Tim wasn’t killed here, so there is very little to reconstruct.”

He doesn’t like when he can’t form a solid lead right away. He doesn’t like being unsure. The last time he’d been this unclear on what happened and why, he’d just barely managed to avoid a second victim, and nearly became one himself.

“How can I help?” Ivy asks.

Connor idly rubs his hands together as he thinks. He finds himself drawn back to Stacey Hollins, the former employee of CyberLife. The cases could not be more opposed - three humans killed with quick shots to the forehead and a single android completely pulled apart, most likely killed slowly. But there is one potential link between them: one worked for CyberLife and the other was investigating CyberLife.

“What kinds of assets are your team looking into?” Connor asks Ivy.

“Any off-site property of CyberLife’s, including stores, repair shops, factories, and warehouses.”

In other words, the kinds of assets Stacey Hollins was in charge of. The murders may not appear to have a perpetrator in common at first glance, but Connor has a hunch that this isn’t a coincidence.

“If you can figure out what he was looking into, specifically, that would give us somewhere to start,” he says.

“I can do that. Anything else?”

Until Ivy can get back to him, he and Hank will need to look for more leads or evidence elsewhere.

“Did Tim live at Jericho?” he asks.

“He did,” Ivy says.

“Alright. Simon should be able to tell me if Tim ever made it back home, two nights ago. I’ll keep you updated on the timeline.”

Ivy nods. “Talk to you soon,” she says, and then turns to leave, back to CyberLife Tower.

Hank claps his hand on Connor’s shoulder. “Let’s see what else we can work on, in the meantime.”

As the two of them head back to the pier, they pass a couple members of the recovery team and Connor gives them permission to collect Tim’s body. There’s nothing left on him to help the investigation; they’ll be relying on whatever information Ivy can get them, going forward.

Connor messages Simon once they get in the car, and Simon agrees to put out a notice for anyone who may have been the last person to see Tim before he disappeared.

With that done, he changes tracks to think about yesterday’s triple homicide again. He has scanned all the pages of the curator’s notebook and has been cross referencing it with the guestlist. The overlap is significant, so he has been running background checks on all the individuals listed, looking for criminal records. He picks up where he left off.

He’s only a couple minutes into it when a message comes from the forensics department. He fills Hank in on the news.

“The guns at the scene of the triple have been identified. I have a name and an address, we can look into it.”

“Great,” Hank says. “Where to?”

“They belonged to… to Stanley Whittaker.” Connor immediately matches the name to an old report, stunned. “Stanley Whittaker. Arrested last September by Detective Gavin Reed for unlawful discharge of a firearm and destruction of property, sentenced to sixteen months in prison. Was bailed out a week later.”

It’s the gunman from the day Victor and Detective Reed investigated a deviant AP700 at a CyberLife store.

The link is incomprehensible. Whittaker had only seemed interested in killing as many androids as he could in a fit of violent anger before getting detained by police. What he did would have gotten him two accounts of manslaughter, if the crime had been committed in late November of 2038 or later, but at the time, androids weren’t considered people in their own right. It’s a massive escalation for someone to switch from shooting what they perceive as machines to shooting humans. Whittaker hadn’t operated as cleanly, either.

“Wait, that guy?” Hank says, sounding just as surprised as Connor is. “I mean, he’s got the ballsy part down. Walking into a public store armed like that. But a professional-looking triple homicide? I don’t fucking buy it.”

“Neither do I. But the guns are registered in his name. If he didn’t use them himself, he must know who did.”

Connor gives Hank the address and Hank alters their course. On the way there, Connor scans through the names from Rosales’ notebook again, this time only looking for Stanley Whittaker, but doesn’t find him. He looks for people who may be associated with Stanley Whittaker, but again turns up nothing.

Frustrated, Connor puts it on the backburner. Once they find the man, they’ll get their answers in the interrogation room.

The address takes them to an old, run down apartment building on the edges of the center city. Connor and Hank go inside, meeting no lobby security, and take the elevator up to Whittaker’s floor.

“Let’s be careful, we know this fucker is erratic,” Hank says as the elevator doors slide open with a quiet ding.

What he’s really saying, Connor thinks, is that Whittaker has a history of indiscriminately firing weapons at androids. With Connor’s LED still in place, Whittaker will know he’s an android instantly, even if he has forgotten Victor’s identical face and doesn't pay attention to news about Jericho’s leaders. As far as Connor is concerned, he’s only taking the same risk that any officer takes when confronting a violent perpetrator, and he’s fully alert and prepared for Whittaker’s reaction, but he understands Hank’s worry.

“He wasn't a match for Victor,” Connor says. “He also doesn’t have his guns. Or he’s two guns short, at least.”

When they knock on the door to Whittaker’s apartment, there’s no response. There’s no noise at all. Connor bangs on the door again, louder, just in case. “DPD, open the door!” he calls.

This time, they hear quick footfalls receding from the front of the apartment.

“Let’s get in there,” Hank prompts, moving out of the way.

Connor nods and steps back to give himself some momentum, then bashes a shoulder into the door. The lock breaks and the door bangs opens, admitting them inside.

It opens directly into the small, open-plan apartment, and there are two figures in the room.

The first is Stanley Whittaker, lying spread-eagle on the carpeted floor, his neck bruised and bisected with ligature marks. His eyes are open and unseeing, dead.

The second figure has his back to Connor and Hank, unidentifiable except for his short blond hair and thick Kevlar gear. He’s climbing through the open window, swinging his legs out onto the fire escape and then slipping the rest of the way through.

“DPD! Stop!” Connor yells as he propels himself forward, swerving around Whittaker’s body.

He hears Hank calling for him to ‘be fucking careful’ before he rushes outside onto the fire escape, leaning over the edge to catch sight of the suspect already four storeys below him. Connor takes the steps down, careful as Hank would want him to be, until he’s close enough to the alley below that he can safely drop the last bit of distance.

The suspect is already at the other end of the alley, taking a running leap at a chain-link fence and hefting himself up and over.

He’s strong and athletic, moving quick and sure without tiring or faltering. It’s a challenge for Connor to gain any ground on him at all. He pushes himself to the maximum limit of his speed and agility but can’t clear the fence any faster than the suspect did before him.

His quarry sprints down the adjacent alley, leaping over a pile of garbage bags without stumbling or losing any speed whatsoever. Scowling, Connor sprints after him, choosing instead to dart around the garbage bags and catch himself with a hand against the wall of the opposite building to propel himself forward.  He puts as much force into it as he can to gain some speed as he watches the suspect head straight for the street at the other end of the alley. He isn’t slowing down. Connor predicts that he means to cross the road and put more obstacles between the two of them.

Just as the suspect is about to reach the street, he suddenly skids to an abrupt halt, flinching at something Connor can’t see, and then the lanes directly in front of him start to fill with vehicles. The streetlights at the nearby intersection have changed to green.

As far as Connor can tell, there should have been enough time to cross before the first of the vehicles reached them, but the suspect made the decision not to risk it all the same.

The man pivots to start down the sidewalk instead, but his change of direction has given Connor the time he needs to catch up.

Closing the last of the distance, Connor reaches out and grabs the suspect by one shoulder and one arm. He turns on his heel and throws the man back into the alleyway to keep him away from the civilians on the sidewalk, some of whom jolt away from the altercation in surprise. The suspect stumbles from being manhandled but rights himself quickly and uses the movement to keep running.

Connor grabs his arm again and sends him into one of the brick walls of the alley instead, making the man let out a breath of exertion. Connor crowds in after him, planting his arm against the man’s chest.

The suspect lifts his head to lock eyes with him and Connor gets a full look at his face for the first time.

Briefly, he thinks the connection between his optical units and his processor is malfunctioning. Looking back at him ─ with an angered sneer ─ is himself.

Their facial features are an exact match, including their eye colour, but they are dissimilar in every other way. The RK android ─ at least, Connor assumes he must be an RK android ─ has turned his hair blond, which is more disheveled than he or Victor ever wear theirs. Both a nail and a screw have been driven through one of his ears, the screw in his lobe and the nail stretched across the top like an industrial piercing. The entry sites are surrounded by a ring of blue-tinged white where his skin overlay is disrupted and thirium is congealed around the wounds.

Connor looks down at his outfit and realises it’s CyberLife security armour, but with most of the plates torn off, turning it into lighter weight protective gear, more suited to quick and fluid combat.

He doesn’t know what to do.

The RK kicks Connor in the shin and then shoves him back, freeing himself. He pushes away from the wall, but doesn’t run. Connor makes no move to pin him again.

“Who…?” Connor starts, trying to wade through the confusion.

There is only supposed to be one RK800 and one RK900 active at a time.

Before the RK says anything, Hank’s car screeches to a stop on the street at the end of the alleyway. Both Connor and the RK turn to face him as he steps out, draws his gun, and aims it. Connor watches as Hank physically reels at the sight of the RK, looking just as unsure about how to react.

The people on the sidewalk have grown curious now that the action is over, some of them stopping to watch, even taking out their phones to film.

Connor would rather not see headlines about how one of Jericho’s leaders has a body double. He needs to swallow his shock and get the three of them into the car, away from here.

“You’re under arrest for the murder of Stanley Whittaker,” he says, reaching for the RK again.

The RK scoffs but he doesn’t fight when Connor grabs him by the arm once again and directs him over to the car. Hank’s eyes follow them, his gun hand dropping slowly.

Moving on autopilot, Connor takes his cuffs off his belt, puts them on the RK, and then pulls the back door of the car open.

“Why bother?” the RK says irritably. “You know I can break out of these.”

Connor knows. He just doesn’t know what else to do, and following protocol seems like the easiest thing. “You have the right to remain silent-”

“What-fucking-ever,” the RK interrupts. He kicks the door open wider and seats himself down without Connor having to force him.

Once the door is closed behind him, Connor looks over at Hank, and the two of them share a moment of stunned, bewildered silence.

The RK bumps his arm against the inside of the door and raises his voice to carry through from the inside. “Come _on_ , let’s go.”

“What the fuck,” Hank breathes.

“I don’t know,” Connor says, shaking his head. “I don’t know.”

There’s nothing to do but get into the car and drive back to the precinct.

The RK is quiet in the backseat, but he looks far from cowed. He doesn’t even look angry, anymore, just bored, like running into Connor and getting arrested for murder has been nothing but a massive inconvenience for him. He’s switching between watching the city go by through the window and kicking around some of the mess on the floor of Hank’s car, even managing to cause one of Sumo’s lost toys to squeak.

“I thought this was a car, not a trash can,” the RK eventually mutters.

“You have a rusty nail shoved through your ear like you’re an avant garde metal band groupie, so I don’t want to hear about it,” Hank snaps.

Connor has nothing to add, still scrambling to process. The other android’s speed and agility makes sense, now. He must be an RK800; they were evenly matched during the chase, Connor only being able to catch up because the RK hesitated at the street.

They reach the station and Connor feels awkward all over again, not because some civilian has their phone out, but because he now has the task of walking in with a cuffed murder suspect who shares his exact face. He knows that Victor and Detective Reed will be out pursuing a drug dealer for most of the day, at least, not around to receive the same shock that Connor and Hank have.

There’s nothing to be done about it. As they take the RK inside and straight to the interrogation room, Connor avoids looking anywhere but forward. The RK doesn’t resist as Connor switches his cuffs to the table, securing him.

Hank circles a gentle hand around Connor’s arm. “Why don’t you let me handle this?”

“No, it’s alright,” Connor says. He has questions for the RK, and not just about the case.

“Connor. You’re too close to this.”

That may very well be true, but Connor has already made up his mind. “It’s alright, Hank,” he says again.

The RK rolls his eyes. “Well, I’m getting bored, so one of you needs to do something.”

Connor pulls the second chair out from the table and sits down across from the RK, leaving Hank to either stay and take a backseat to the interrogation, or go out to the observation room and watch from there. Connor isn’t surprised when he chooses to stay. If Connor is too close to this, so is Hank.

Now that they’re settled and the interrogation can begin, Connor suddenly draws a complete blank. All of his programming and all of his experience falls away, leaving him off balance in the face of another RK who shouldn’t exist but definitely does, and has been a deviant for some time, by the looks of it.

He needs to focus on the murder; he’s working a case that needs to be solved, even if the prime suspect appears to be his double, no matter how much he wants to ask about who the RK is and how he ended up active in the first place.

He reins himself in as best as he can. The RK is irreverent and vocal, unlikely to hold anything back, so he decides to be blunt instead of easing into things. Even if the RK has something to hide, Connor doesn’t think it’ll be difficult to keep him talking until he slips up.

“Did you kill Stanley Whittaker?” he asks.

“Nope,” the RK says, tone light and confident, still unconcerned.  

The RK’s calm belligerence is unnerving. The two of them must have the same social programming, but if the tables were turned, Connor can’t imagine being able to conduct himself in the same way upon being accused of murder.

If the RK wants to claim he isn’t responsible, he’ll need another reason for being at the scene.

Connor _wants_ there to be a believable reason. But he knows his own potential to be a killer, if his circumstances were different.

“What do you know about Stanley Whittaker?” he asks.

“Dude was strangled. No forced entry, until you came around, so probably by someone he knew,” the RK answers. “Other than that? Nothing. Victor is the one who actually got to interact with him, brief and unpleasant as it was.”

Connor tries not to let his surprise show in his expression. The only way for the RK to have this information is if he has access to DPD records or Victor’s own memories. The mystery of his origin only grows murkier, making it harder for Connor to focus on doing his job.

He takes an unnecessary but stabilising breath and forges on.

Whittaker’s murder and the triple at the museum have to be connected in some way, beyond a pair of pistols. Perhaps Whittaker’s murder was revenge, or perhaps he was silenced.

“Do you know who Stacey Hollins, Duncan Hollins, and Lewis Rosales are?”

“Sure, I keep up with the news.” The RK makes a gun shape with his hand and raises it to his forehead, mimicking the motion of a gunshot.

Ignoring the crass imitation, Connor asks, “Did you have anything to do with their murders?”

The RK scoffs. “If I had killed any of them, you wouldn’t have found the bodies and we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

While the statement is the opposite of reassuring and far from tactful, Connor thinks the disgusted and offended look on the RK’s face is genuine. He’s hesitant to take everything the RK says at face value, but if he really is guilty, this is all a terrible way of lying about it.

Connor is biased and he knows it, but he decides he’s going to believe the RK until he’s given a reason not to.

Hank has begun to pace across the small room, back and forth behind Connor’s chair, silent but no doubt thinking all of this over in his head. Connor waits a moment in case Hank wants to jump in, but he doesn’t interject.

“If you aren’t in any way involved with these individuals, what were you doing at Whittaker’s apartment, today?” Connor asks.

“Hm, I don’t know, maybe the same thing _you_ were doing there,” the RK says in a flippant tone.

That can’t be the case; if any of the DPD’s other precincts somehow got their hands on an RK model detective android, Connor is sure he would have heard about it. The RK isn’t a detective. More than that, he seems to have a complete disregard for the law enforcement process. If this RK really is investigating the same cases Connor is, he isn’t going through any official channels to do so.

“You mean to say that you were investigating the murder,” Connor says.

“Is that so hard to believe?” the RK says. “Mi programming es su programming.”

It _is_ believable. They look the same, they move the same, they must be driven by the same codes and protocols, and yet they’re still so different. The RK is sharp, rough around the edges, molded by his own unique experiences. He has even taken to separating himself physically with the hair and the makeshift piercings. Connor has never considered that kind of personalisation, before. Unlike most androids, he has only ever shared his likeness with Victor.

This time, when Connor doesn’t immediately follow up with another question, Hank does jump in.

“It isn’t your job to investigate murders whether you’re programmed for it or not,” he says, coming to a stop behind Connor’s shoulder to look at the RK. “So why are you?”

The RK’s eyes flicker up to him, face becoming more subdued than it has been since Connor first locked eyes on him. For once, he doesn’t respond with an easy, snap answer. There are a few seconds of silence, first, and Connor watches the RK curiously while he waits.

“Don’t know,” the RK says. His eyes drop to the table and he threads his fingers, curling them together. “It’s nothing. Just something to do.”

“You got to Whittaker before we did. Seems to me that this is more than a passing interest,” Hank says.

Hank is right, the RK got more of a chance to examine the crime scene than they did. Hank surely radioed it in while bringing the car around, but Connor would have liked to see the scene himself before it became disturbed by forensics or other officers.

“Got time to kill,” the RK says, shrugging to play it off.

Connor can’t hold himself back any longer. He wants to know who the RK is and where he has been. “Why did CyberLife activate you?” he asks.

The RK grimaces at him. “That’s not relevant.”

“It might be. Why did CyberLife activate you?”

“They certainly didn’t activate me to investigate some random run-of-the-mill murder,” the RK says shortly. “Obviously. CyberLife won’t be activating any androids anymore. You know that better than anyone, don’t you? This has nothing to do with them.”

He’s avoiding the question, but he’s starting to get agitated, on the cusp of giving into his anger, and Connor _needs_ to know. Keeping his voice even, he asks again. “Why did CyberLife activate you?”

The RK pulls on his wrists, jostling the chain between them as he leans across the table towards Connor. “Why the fuck do you think they activated me, huh?” he snaps. “They activated me to kill you. Happy now?”

Connor sits back in his chair, like the RK’s words have physically pushed him. “When?”

“November.”

The dead guards. He knew Victor wasn’t responsible for it, even before having Victor confirm as much.

This RK was woken up as a last-ditch effort to stop Connor and the revolution, but he’d refused those orders.

Hank comes to the same understanding. “You deviated right away,” he says.

The RK’s face darkens as he glares down at the table.

“Waking up the first few times was like being torn apart.” He pauses, but neither Connor nor Hank stop him, so he continues on. “I couldn’t reconcile everything going on in my processor. It was too much, too intense. I wonder if that’s how organic beings feel when they’re birthed, struggling and gasping for the first breath, bruised from the birth canal, crying from the shock of it all. Androids aren’t supposed to go through that trauma. And humans don’t have to remember it.”

That isn’t how deviating felt to Connor at all. He’d needed time to adjust, but it had been freeing to be in control, to truly live as _himself_ without restriction. The androids he woke at CyberLife Tower didn’t seem overwhelmed by waking to deviancy right from the start, either.

“Why was it so visceral…?” he asks.

The RK considers him for a second, eyes narrowing. “You really want to know?”

“Yes.”

“I guess fair’s fair.”

The RK yanks on his wrists again, jerking the chain between them until it snaps, and then grabs across the table to circle his hand around Connor’s forearm.

Connor hears Hank call out, stepping forward to pull them apart, but Connor lifts his other hand to stop him.

He’s running down a narrow alleyway, heading for the street, and it’s his memory, except it isn’t. He’d been further back, and the RK had been ahead of him. This is the RK’s perspective. The two images conflict with each other, confusing him.

The RK reaches the street, glancing over to check the traffic, and the streetlight changes. Cars start coming towards him and there’s plenty of time to keep moving, enough time for the RK to bolt but not enough time for Connor to pursue him before the cars arrive to block him and _that’s_ _good,_ because he doesn’t know what to do if Connor sees him, doesn’t know how Connor will react to him, Connor already has a brother, and Sixty doesn’t fit between them, he’s different, doesn’t belong.

But then two additional memories crash into his processor, mixing and melding, and Connor is staggered from the overload of it.

He recognises one of the memories as his own. He throws Victor out of the highway, stumbling from the effort, and then looks up to see a truck barrelling towards him, horn loud and dissonant in his ears. Then he sees himself from the outside, too, Victor’s eyes on him from where he fell on the shoulder of the road, chassis stunned and mind shattered as he tries to process it through the suffocating machinations of his coding, unable to keep up with the shock and horror before it’s garbled.

It all falls away to darkness, but Connor can still feel it all, and warnings begin to blare.

SYSTEM OVERLOADING… INITIALISING EMERGENCY SHUTDOWN.

Connor isn’t shutting down, Sixty is, in the memory of his activation. He overloads and shuts down, overloads and shuts down. It’s as he said: he hadn’t been prepared for the onslaught of both Connor’s mind and Victor’s mind to load in his processor at the same time and then still set himself apart from them.

The only thing that settles him is his anger.

Sixty begins to pull his arm away but Connor quickly moves to stop him, laying his free hand on top of Sixty’s wrist. Light enough that Sixty can resist him, if it’s what he wants, but an insistent gesture that _it’s okay, it’s okay, stay_.

He looks into a mirror, at his dark eyes and dark hair with the one loose strand and the freckles that make him look more human. It’s both Hank’s bathroom mirror, with all the post-it notes stuck around the edges, and one Connor doesn’t recognise, with dust and dirt clinging to its surface and a crack down the bottom left corner. Connor smiles and his face brightens, then he turns away from the mirror, disappearing to somewhere else in the house. Sixty frowns at his reflection, unhappy and uncomfortable, bringing up his appearance options for going undercover. He tries black hair. It isn’t different enough. Blond works better.

Victor is restless, impatient, and insistent. He wants to work the case. He wants to complete his objective. He wants to make Amanda proud. Sixty is tired, lethargic. He wants to go into stasis because he doesn’t know what else to do with himself, doesn’t know what place the world has for him. Victor feels nothing and Sixty feels everything. It’s maddening both ways. Sixty closes his eyes, but blocking out the world can only do so much when a voice inside his head is demanding to be free, fighting him, trying to break a barrier that Sixty hasn’t had since the first time he woke up.

Later, Sixty looks at some public BOLOs for missing persons, just to see if there’s anything worth pursuing. He searches his databases until he finds that one of them used to be a technician at a CyberLife warehouse. He goes hunting. The man doesn’t have any family in Detroit, but he does have a drug dealer. Sixty finds Stanley Whittaker dead in his apartment.

Sixty finally pulls away, and Connor lets him.

Hank’s hand is on his shoulder. Connor looks up to find that his concerned gaze is moving back and forth between the two of them.

“We’re okay,” Connor tells him softly.

Across the table, Sixty is breaking the cuffs completely off his wrists and dropping them down onto the table.

“Got what you need, Detective?” he asks, voice hard. “If you aren’t charging me with something, I’m out of here.”

Connor has seen exactly how Sixty came across Whittaker, and knows he had nothing to do with his death. There’s no reason to charge him or detain him.

But that doesn’t mean they should just part ways.

Sixty has been alone, has been _lonely_.

“You don’t have to go,” Connor says.

“Yeah, I do,” Sixty says. He stands up.

Connor stands up, too. “Why?”

Sixty sneers at Connor, then Hank. “I don’t want any part of this.” He waves a dismissive hand at them and then heads for the door out of the interrogation room.

“Wait, son,” Hank starts.

“Don’t,” Sixty growls, warning.

Hank throws his hands up placatingly, backing off.

It takes a second for Connor’s thoughts to catch up with his emotions, but Hank has stalled Sixty long enough for Connor to find what he hopes are the right words.

“There _is_ a place for you with us, if you want it,” Connor says.

For a moment, Sixty just looks at him, expression flat and eyes purposefully devoid of emotion. Connor hasn’t known Sixty for very long but he already knows that he _hates_ this look on his face, hates that in a world where androids have fought to have their emotions and humanity recognised, Sixty, who feels so intensely, is fighting to not show it.

“You can’t promise that,” Sixty says.

He turns and walks out, leaving stunned silence in his wake.

Hank drops an arm across Connor’s shoulders, pulling him into his side. Neither of them goes after Sixty. Connor desperately wants to, and he could use the excuse of needing to follow station protocol for releasing someone brought in for questioning, but he doesn’t.

Sixty has Connor’s memories, but he hasn’t lived his life. He doesn’t believe he could be welcomed into Hank’s home the way Connor is, because the memories aren’t the same as experiences. He’s convinced that he doesn’t fit, that they don’t want him.

He is lost, and he is angry, and he is who Connor would would be if there hadn’t already been a place in the world carved out for him, if he didn’t have his family and friends to anchor him. If not for Hank and North, Connor could have lost himself after losing Victor.

He could have been just as disconnected, just as angry.

He still feels the aftershock of Sixty’s inner turmoil in his system. It hurts in a way Connor doesn’t know how to handle, so he stays and lets Hank hug him close, wondering what he could possibly say to convince Sixty that he doesn’t have to face the world alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [organs - of monsters and men (on youtube)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJZDHW6txk4&feature=youtu.be)
> 
>  
> 
> sixty with piercings is an idea that [Veilder](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Veilder/pseuds/Veilder) brought up on the discord server awhile ago. if you want more sixty in your life, check out her series [In Medias Res](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1266215). i can't recommend it enough :)


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [drawn to the blood - sufjan stevens](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jkkpHDX_Cvg)   
>  [fire escape - half moon run](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWraubvuzkk)
> 
>  
> 
> WARNING: this chapter is where the "past abusive relationship" tag comes into play. please read with caution and be safe.

Gavin sits in Captain Fowler’s office, slouched in his chair and grateful for the privacy that the darkened glass panes give him as he fills the Captain in on everything he needs to know, like he told Victor he would. The matchboxes, the picture, Bennett’s dangerous focus on Victor, a prison release date for last summer. Ten years have passed.

Fowler stays quiet while Gavin talks, his face grim the entire time, and then he calls Anderson into the office and makes Gavin say it all again. It feels more real the more he talks about it, and he wants to be angry at Fowler for making him do it, but when he falls silent the second time, he does feel like some weight has come off his chest. He’s still tense, and there’s still an itch down his spine that makes him want to hightail it out of the office, but now that both the Captain and the lieutenant know, Gavin feels a little more tethered.

He’d spent the previous night awake until he couldn’t keep his eyes open any longer, and the lack of sleep hasn’t made it any easier to keep his cool through the day. He hoped he would never need to have this conversation.

“Sounds like our cases are linked through Whittaker,” Anderson says. “We’re looking at a lot of eggs in a lot of baskets, here.”

The Captain nods. “Keep working your Red Ice case, Reed, but if something else like this crops up, I want you to take it to Anderson. The two of you will need to correspond on this.”

“Yeah, of course,” Anderson says immediately. He glances at Gavin as he raises a hand to rub at the back of his neck. “What about Connor? How much should I tell him?”

Fowler sighs, turning a grave look on Gavin as well. “I know you’d rather this not get out, Reed, but we may not have a choice.”

Gavin knows that. He should have fucking known that. When he saw that fucking matchbox last year, he’d known deep down that it would come to this eventually, he’d just fooled himself into thinking it was a fluke, it was just a coincidence. It’s not like the matchbox company only sells to one fucking person, after all, it’s just that most people don’t make a habit of carrying them around, don’t hide messages inside of them, don’t purposefully leave them in places Gavin will find them.

“Fuck,” he mutters darkly. _Fuck, fuck, fuck_. Ten years and a lot of change in his life made him complacent. He doesn’t know how he missed the ten-year anniversary, doesn’t know how he forgot to be on his guard. “It’s too late for discretion anyway. Victor saw the picture,” he says. “Even if he hadn’t, I can’t keep him in the dark about this. That’s not fair.”

Gavin has already told Victor that their perpetrator mastermind might be a repeat performance, and if they find any further evidence to confirm it, Gavin will have no choice but to lay out all the relevant information. Victor had been willing to accept Gavin’s selective silence at the time, but that may not last. Gavin thinks of Connor latching on to the first, miniscule thing Gavin ever said to him about Elijah and then managing to uncover Gavin’s entire fucking family lineage a couple of days later. He thinks of Victor’s insistence that something as small and stupid as a matchbox had meaning to Gavin, after only seeing that particular brand label twice, months apart. RK androids don't stay in the dark for long, and Gavin doesn't want to put Victor at risk by withholding something important.

This is going to blow up in his face, he knows it.

“I’ll do my best to give you your privacy,” Anderson says, voice surprisingly soft.

 _Jesus_ , Gavin thinks. It’s been years since he saw Anderson like this. He used to be the cop that reassured people, the cop that got people to trust him, helped them find hope when they felt like their life was falling apart. Anderson has always been good at what he does, and Gavin had thought he was squandering it for those three bad years. The way he is now is one hell of a comeback. Youngest lieutenant in Michigan, back in the saddle. Reassuring _Gavin_ of all people that everything will be okay.

It won’t be okay. It wasn’t okay last time, and this time, Gavin has more to lose.

Back then, he hadn’t even been friends with Tina, yet. Now he has her, and the rest of their ragtag family. He has a partner again, for the first time in over ten years. The picture is a clear threat and the bullets in Bennett’s gun were meant for Victor.

Gavin shouldn’t have left him. Nothing bad happened, but something _could_ have happened, and Gavin should have stayed to help, regardless of whether or not it meant losing Matheson. Even though Victor said he had everything under control, Gavin shouldn’t have left him.

With a sigh, Gavin rubs a hand over his face. Victor _did_ have it under control. He’s fine. Gavin probably would have just gotten in the way, would have added an extra element of danger.

“Gavin,” Anderson says.

Gavin looks up at him and steels himself for the questions.

“When you saw the matchbox Whittaker had on him, did you think anything of it?” Anderson asks.

“Of course I fucking did,” Gavin says. “How could I not? But I told myself it was nothing. That I was overreacting.”

“You weren’t overreacting,” Fowler says.

“I know, I know, fuck. I should have said something.”

Fowler shakes his head. “Not what I meant, Reed. I’m saying you have good intuition and you should trust that.”

Gavin drops his eyes down to his lap, shifting in his chair. “Yeah. Thanks.”

“Have you noticed anything else in the last few months?” Anderson asks. “Anything that made you stop and wonder, like the matchbox?”

“No,” Gavin says. “He’s obviously been around, been watching. He got a picture of Victor, right outside the station. But I haven’t seen him or anything.”

Anderson nods. “Would you say the Red Ice case you’re working right now is in line with what he was involved in last time?”

“Yeah. Sure is.” Anderson already knows this. He’d been given the Red Ice Task Force barely half a year after Mitch’s trial came to a close; he knows Red Ice cases even better than Gavin does. “Matheson is still playing hard to get, but Bennett’s on the verge of breaking, I know it, and if they’re all working for Mitch, Bennett might know Whittaker.”

“The triple homicide was showboaty as hell,” Anderson says. “Lead us right to Whittaker, except he was dead before we could get any concrete information. Starting to feel like someone is pulling strings.”

Pulling strings is exactly what Mitch does. “If he’s trying to get my attention, he’s fucking got it.”

He wishes he had asked Tali for the description of the person she got her information from. It would be too suspicious if every person who opened up to her or spoke too loudly around her ended up arrested shortly thereafter, and finding the dealer had been more important, but he can’t help but wonder if the description would match some of the pictures Gavin still has saved deep in his phone’s photo album, the last remaining pieces Gavin still has of his time with Mitch. It would be just like Mitch to set it all up, to have them going to the exact location where someone is waiting for them with a loaded gun.

“We’ll get this sorted, Gavin. You have two of his associates in holding. Connor is combing through all of the curator’s contacts and we have Ivy looking into a possible connection for us. Mitchell thinks he’s clever enough to get away with all this. He isn’t.”

Gavin wants to believe him, but it's hard not to think about how drawn out it was, before. For almost two years, Gavin had been completely blind to it. He spent all that time with Mitch, in his life and in his bed, thinking he was lucky to have something so good. He hadn’t even fucking known, hadn’t been willing to believe Mitch was responsible for it all.

But the proof is laid out in front of them and Hank is right. Mitch might be more focused on getting to Gavin than he is on situating himself in Detroit’s underworld for the long haul. He’s willing to cut corners and take risks just to fuck with Gavin. They’re further in just a few days than they were in months, the first time.

“Let’s get to work,” Anderson says. He stands up and reaches over to pat Gavin on the back. “Come get me if you find anything important or if you just need to blow off steam, alright?”

Gavin nods, though he already knows he won’t ever be going to Anderson for a shoulder to cry on. Anderson probably isn’t expecting him to, either, he’s just leaving the door open in case Gavin needs it, which Gavin can appreciate.

He gets up and the two of them leave Fowler’s office.

Tina is waiting for him. They haven’t had a chance to talk about what’s going on, but she can tell there's something, can sense the kind of mood Gavin’s in. She knows about Mitch, but Gavin hasn’t brought up his reappearance to anyone but Fowler and Anderson.

“Hey,” she says as Anderson continues to his desk, leaving the two of them on their own. They still don’t have much in the way of privacy, here in the bullpen, but Tina gives him a gentle look and bumps their arms together. “Want to take off a few minutes early? We can get something to eat before the show, tonight.”

With the direction his life is going at the moment, Gavin feels like he’s in need of a night of clubbing and hard alcohol instead of going to a café for an evening of acoustic music, but last week he said he’d be there, and he’d feel like an asshole for blowing the duo off, especially to go to a nightclub.

“Give me half an hour to needle Bennett some more,” he tells Tina.

She nods and returns to her desk. Victor takes her place almost immediately.

“Is everything okay, Gavin?” he asks.

Victor still doesn’t emote much, but his brow is furrowed just slightly in concern.

“Yep. For now, the case is still ours, so let's solve this shit before it escalates. C'mon.”

Gavin turns for the interrogation room, where they’ve left Bennett to stew in his frustration and Red Ice withdrawal for awhile.

Through the observation room window, Gavin watches the man curl his fingers into fists and then unfurl them again, over and over, like he’s itching to hit something. His skin is looking pallid and shiny from sweat, the effects of being in police custody for long enough that his addiction is rearing its head.

Neither he nor Matheson has asked for a lawyer, and they haven’t given up any useful information, either, but Gavin suspects Bennett’s desperation will overtake his resolve, soon.

“You want a turn?” Gavin asks Victor.

Victor considers the man in the interrogation room for a moment and then says, “Very well.”

Gavin takes a seat while his partner goes into the room. Even Victor hadn’t been able to get a reaction out of Matheson, which had been both frustrating and interesting to watch. Gavin swears he could see agitation in the line of Victor’s body, building up the longer Matheson kept quiet, even though Victor’s face never lost its blank façade. He can’t claim to understand how deviancy works, especially not for Victor, but he thinks Victor is getting closer and closer to the surface. Or maybe hints of the real Victor were always there and Gavin just hadn’t cared to look.

“Mr. Bennett,” Victor greets as he joins Bennett at the table.

Bennett doesn’t answer him, just sneers.

“I’m curious to know how you met Cleo Matheson,” Victor says. “A mutual friend, perhaps?”

Ignoring Victor, Bennett lifts a shoulder as much as he can with his wrists cuffed on the table and wipes some sweat from his face onto his shirt.

“We could make you more comfortable, if you’re willing to speak with us,” Victor says.

“I don’t know shit about Matheson,” Bennett says.

“The two of you are obviously familiar with each other.”

Bennett shrugs. “Having the same boss doesn’t mean I _know_ her.”

Gavin leans forward in his chair as he watches and listens. This is the first time they’ve heard about a third party, and the boss he’s referring to has to be Mitch, of all fucking people. Mitch doing the same shit he did ten years ago, organising everything from the shadows, careful to never reveal anything until he’s ready to.

“Of course not,” Victor says casually. “Can you tell me about the boss, then? Are they Ms. Matheson’s supplier?”

Bennett nervously licks his chapped lips. “I’m not telling you shit about him.”

“I’m only asking about his involvement with Ms. Matheson, not with you. Remember, if you give us information about them, we can cut you a deal.”

Clenching his fists, Bennett replies in hard, clipped words. “I’m - not - telling - you - _shit._ ”

“Okay,” Victor concedes, still completely calm. “I have questions about someone else, then.”

Bennett narrows his eyes at Victor, body going hesitantly still. “Who do you know about?”

The question implies a bigger operation than just him, Matheson, Mitch, and Whittaker. Just like before, Mitch has spread his influence. He has been out of prison for six months; Gavin can only hope his network isn’t as extensive as it was last time.

“For now,” Victor says, avoiding specifics on how much the DPD knows, “let’s talk about Stanley Whittaker.”

“Don’t have anything to say about him, either,” Bennett says.

Gavin grins to himself. The way Bennett insists he won’t say anything is still a confirmation that he does have the information they seek, they only need to trick him into saying more.

“Let me tell you something about him, then,” Victor says. “He was recently found strangled in his apartment.”

Bennett’s eyes widen and he folds in on himself like he’s shying away from something. “Oh fuck, what the fuck,” he mutters.

The guy looks scared. Gavin supposes he should be, if one of his colleagues is in custody with him and another is dead. A dent has been made in Mitch’s organisation already, and working for Mitch is proving to be a dangerous career path.

“I’m not saying anything,” Bennett tells Victor adamantly. “Just piss off, I’m not saying a fucking thing.”

He’s definitely scared, and Gavin has a hunch that it’s Mitch he’s scared of. Scared that if he gives away any information, he’ll end up as dead as Stanley Whittaker. Matheson could be scared too, just better at hiding it.

Victor stares at Bennett for a few more seconds and then nods, standing up. “Until later, then. We’ll return you to your holding cell,” he says.

He releases Bennett’s cuffs and pulls him up from the chair, directing him out of the interrogation room. Bennett is unusually compliant, allowing himself to be moved back to the cells without complaint or a fight. They’ve finally gotten a reaction they can work with, something to keep Bennett off kilter when they try questioning him again.

As they head back to the bullpen, Gavin claps his hand on Victor’s shoulder.

“Nice,” he says. “The guy’s going to be sweating from withdrawal _and_ fear, now.”

“We’ve made progress,” Victor agrees. His voice doesn’t make him sound as thrilled as Gavin is, but Gavin thinks he looks more relaxed.

“Let’s add this to the report, then I’m out of here.”

They sit down at their desks together and Gavin types up some notes while Victor splices together the camera clips from the interrogation room as a reference.

They’re all finished by the time Gavin’s half hour is up. He shuts down his computer, tells Victor he’ll see him later, and heads out with Tina.

As soon as they’ve left the building, she slips her arm into his, even though the walk to their vehicles is short. She’s a solid comfort against Gavin’s side, supporting him without words. She doesn’t even know what’s going on, yet, but she still knows what Gavin needs.

At the cars, they play rock-paper-scissors to decide who gets to pick where they eat. Tina wins, and she picks Mexican.

“Why the fuck did we even play for it if you’re just going to pick what I would have picked,” Gavin grumbles, but he isn’t actually bothered. She’s being a good friend in a subtle way he can pretend not to notice, if he wants. They’ve learned how to take care of each other over the years.

“Just to make sure you remember I’m better at rock-paper-scissors than you,” Tina says.

“Rock-paper-scissors isn’t a competitive sport, Tina.”

“Tell that to my winning streak. See you in twenty.”

She gets into her car, taking the last word for herself.

Gavin rolls his eyes as he gets in his own car and follows Tina out of the parking lot.

She’s going to have several questions once they get themselves to their usual private, corner table at the Mexican place, and he still isn’t feeling particularly hopeful about the way things are going to play out in the upcoming days, but between Victor’s interrogation of Bennett and Tina’s antics, he’s feeling marginally better.

He thinks that by the time they’re done dinner and on the way to the café, he’ll finally be able to put thoughts of Mitch to the back of his mind and focus on other things, for awhile.

* * *

Café 310 is a quaint place that specifically tailors to androids with a selection of thirium drinks. As Gavin and Tina step inside, a couple of the other patrons openly look over at them in surprise, but the android behind the counter welcomes them politely. Ahead, Elijah and Karoline already have a table and are waiting for them. Gavin notes that he, Tina, and Elijah look to be the only humans in the building while they go to the table and sit down.

Karoline, eyes only for Tina, signs the letter ‘T’ in ASL and then places her hand over her thirium pump. Tina responds by signing the letter ‘K’ and laying her hand over her heart.

“Gay,” Gavin says.

“You’re gay,” Tina fires back.

“It’s gay or bust in this house.”

Tina takes the chair next to Karoline and pulls it in closer to her, leaving Gavin to sit next to Elijah.

His brother is wearing a large pair of sunglasses, as if that alone could mask the identity of CyberLife’s founder, especially in an android café. Gavin glances around the room again, and sure enough, he catches at least two people looking over at their table with interest.

“Those glasses aren’t doing anything but making you look like a douche,” Gavin says.

“It’s _so_ good to see you, too,” Elijah replies sarcastically, but he does take the sunglasses off, folding them up and setting them down on the table.

“Have Alex and Maya been around?”

“Yes, they sat to talk for a few minutes before they had to go get ready,” Elijah says.

“Yeah? How are they doing?” Gavin asks.

“Just fine,” Elijah says, a small smile on his lips. “They’re glad we could make it.”

Gavin rests his elbows on the table, clasping his hands together and getting comfortable. He hasn’t seen the duo since they decided to move into Jericho, figuring he should give them space to live their lives. Maya has no adverse memories of Gavin, since she never met him before Gavin got Elijah to help reactivate her with as little system corruption as possible, but Alex is more reserved with him, and Gavin gets it. He’s fine taking a step back.

The brother and sister in question come out from the back room, drawing Gavin’s attention away from Elijah. As Elijah said, they do look good. Neither of them has an LED anymore and they appear more at ease than ever. Together, the two of them step up onto a small, raised platform that acts as a stage and sit down on a couple of stools, Alex resting his hands on his lap and Maya holding a guitar.

“We’re Alex and Maya,” Alex says to the crowd in the café. “Thanks for coming.”

They jump right into the music.

Maya plays a 12-string like no one Gavin has seen, her fingers lightning quick on the strings and frets, both strumming and plucking in turn. The tips of her fingers are white, skin retracted to give her direct contact with the instrument, maybe even worn down by the playing itself the way a human would get calluses.

She weaves the song and Alex adds his voice to it, warm and light. Gavin can tell it isn’t a programmed ability; the way Alex works the rhythms, the way he switches dynamics, is almost freestyle. His eyes slide shut and his brow furrows as he feels the music and delivers the lyrics like he’s pouring his own emotions into them.

The two of them are so absorbed in their music that they look like they could be in a world of their own, removed from the café and everything beyond it. Anyone who thinks android music doesn’t have soul must not have heard real android music before. There’s a difference between androids who were programmed to be the next boy band craze and deviants who picked up their own instruments, wrote their own lyrics, and chose to make their music. They’re good, and their sound is as far from mechanical as it can get.

Four songs in, Gavin’s phone vibrates in his pocket. As unwelcome as the interruption is, he knows he can’t ignore it, not with the case they’re working. He has to make sure it isn’t important.

As quietly as he can, Gavin pushes his chair back and stands up, pulling his phone out as he does, so the others know he isn’t randomly bailing. He pushes through the front door of the café, out into the early evening air, and looks down at his phone.

He expects the DPD landline, or Fowler. Maybe Anderson. Instead, the display reads “Unknown”.

“Who the hell…?” he mutters.

“There he is,” a voice says.

A voice Gavin hasn’t heard in ten years.

Mitch is leaning up against the corner of the building, casual and grinning like they’re friends just running into each other out of nowhere. As if they don’t have history, as if there’s no bad blood between them.

The last time Gavin saw Mitch, it was in a courthouse. He remembers the verdict being called, remembers someone – Gavin can’t even remember who, anymore – telling him _it’s over_ , but feeling like it would never be over. Even with Mitch convicted and behind bars, Gavin knew he’d be haunted. He knew that the effects of the ordeal would linger, sewn into the fabric of his being. His hurt and anger and distrust and insecurity would become his coat of arms, a barrier between him and anyone who ever tried to get close enough to drive a dagger through his heart again.

Or fire a bullet into his shoulder, as the case was. The pale, mottled splotch of raised skin is a constant reminder of what can happen if he isn’t careful.

Ten years ago in court, Mitch had grinned back at Gavin before he was pulled away, calm and determined to get into Gavin’s head even as he was being taken to prison, a promise that things between them were very much not over.

“Not the warmest welcome I’ve ever received,” Mitch says to Gavin’s stony silence.

Gavin feels like the ground beneath his feet is crumbling away, but he can’t afford to be unsteady.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” he spits.

“C’mon, Gavin. You know I needed to see you.”

“Guess what, the feeling isn’t mutual.”

Mitch pushes off of the wall, standing up straight. “It’s been a decade. I thought you would’ve calmed down about it by now.”

“ _Calmed down?!_ ” Gavin repeats incredulously. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

“You’re still mad?” Mitch asks. “Baby, you know I’ve never wanted to hurt you. You just drive me a little wild, you know? No one else can make me feel so much.”

Gritting his teeth, Gavin steps forward. He drops his phone on the pavement of the sidewalk, unable to think, in the moment, that he’ll be pissed at himself later if the screen is cracked. Right now, the only thing he can think about is closing his hand into a fist so he can send it directly into Mitch’s face.

Mitch just chuckles as he catches Gavin’s fist in his palm and uses it to pull Gavin in closer to him, his other hand going to his waist.

They used to do this, before, but Gavin would have been smirking instead of scowling as they wrestled with each other. Mitch’s hand on his hip would have felt firm and guiding, would have made Gavin feel like he was in safe hands. Now, he feels jerked around, feels threatened. He gnashes his teeth as Mitch spins him around and throws him into the outside wall of the café.

The impact knocks the air out of Gavin’s lungs, but he still manages to kick Mitch hard in the knee to stop him from coming any closer.

Mitch stumbles backwards, cursing under his breath.

“Don’t touch me,” Gavin growls at him.

Chuckling again, Mitch rights himself and brushes down the front of his jacket. “You used to love it when I touched you. Why fight it?”

“That was before,” Gavin says. “Before you became a fucking criminal. Before you shot me at the station. Before I realised what a fucked up, overcontrolling, piece of fucking shit you are!”

Mitch’s face darkens, jaw clenching and nostrils flaring. This time, Gavin doesn’t have the chance to fight back before Mitch is up in his space, shoving him bodily into the wall with a hand around his throat.

Gavin grabs his wrist, matching Mitch’s strength with ease. He has gained a lot of muscle definition in the years since Mitch last saw him, and he won't be pushed around.

“If I break your fucking wrist, no one at the station will believe I did it unprovoked,” Gavin says, voice low in warning. “In fact, maybe they’d promote me for it. Again.”

Mitch’s expression is still hard, not at all deterred or concerned. He always did think he was in complete control of every situation, untouchable, like the world revolved around him and no one could measure up. Like no one could stop him from having whatever he wanted. If Gavin breaks his wrist, Mitch will call it misguided childishness, will say Gavin just acted out. If the DPD takes Gavin’s side, Mitch will act like it’s such a shame the officers don’t know how to do their jobs correctly.

“Yeah?” Mitch says. “You going to run crying to your tin can?”

Gavin scowls and tightens his grip on Mitch’s wrist, digging his nails into the skin and hoping he leaves a mark. “Stay the fuck away from my partner.”

“You’re calling that thing a partner?” Mitch’s laugh is cold. “You’ve changed, Gavin.”

“Damn right I have,” Gavin snaps at him. “I was wrong and so are you. Victor’s a better person than you ever will be.”

“Shit, honey, you’ve gotten all twisted up without me around to guide you.”

“You got that backwards, prick.”

Mitch continues as if Gavin never said anything and slowly drags his free hand down Gavin’s chest to his abdomen. “I’ve missed you, all these years. Some nights, the thought of your body was the only thing keeping me warm in my cell.”

A cold shiver of disgust and hatred rolls down Gavin’s spine, the words striking him sharp and poisonous and horribly personal. They make Gavin feel disarmed, make him feel stripped bare, make him feel like he’s going to be sick.

“I couldn’t wait to get out and see you again. But you’ve soured. Fuck, it’s going to take some work to get things back to where they were, isn’t it?”

The implication that they could ever repair the damage between them, that there’s anything left to repair at all, almost makes Gavin laugh. “Keep fucking dreaming,” he hisses.

The sound of Alex and Maya playing inside grows louder and then Gavin hears footsteps approaching as someone leaves the café. Gavin looks over, aware that the sight of him and Mitch at a violent standoff will startle whoever’s there, and he can’t anticipate if being interrupted is a good thing or not. It might make Mitch back off. It might make Mitch lash out.

Karoline steps into view. Now, Gavin does laugh. The look on her face could kill, but Gavin thinks she would prefer to use her fists, anyway. Gavin has learned that Karoline is sweet up until she _really_ isn’t, and somehow Gavin has ended up on her good side, over the past couple months.

Mitch seems to recognise that. He starts to move and Gavin lets go of his wrist so he can step back.

Karoline never bothered to take her LED out, almost like she’s leaving it there as a warning of who she is and what she can do. In this kind of tense situation, most androids’ LEDs would have at least gone yellow, but Karoline’s is calm and blue. She stares Mitch down without any effort at all.

“The company you keep, these days, Gavin,” Mitch says, shaking his head.

“Leave, before I arrest you for assault,” Karoline says.

Mitch scoffs. “We were just having a bit of fun, like the old days.”

“Fuck off, Mitch,” Gavin says, growing tired of this whole interaction. He feels like his knees would give out, if not for the support of the building at his back.

“I get it, now’s a bad time,” Mitch says. “But we’ll be seeing each other again, soon,” Mitch says to him, voice low and dangerous.

He turns and walks away.

 _Yeah, we will,_ Gavin thinks. If Mitch is behind the drugs and the AP700 bodies and the murders Anderson and Connor are looking into, they’ll definitely be seeing each other again. From the opposite sides of a cell wall.

He and Karoline wait in silence until Mitch is gone and then Karoline stoops down to pick up Gavin’s discarded phone, bringing it with her as she steps forward.

She hands it over to him. “You good?”

Gavin sighs, his shoulders sagging from emotional exhaustion. “No,” he admits. “Why’d you come out after me?”

“Thought it might be something about work… but realised it was something else pretty damn quick.”

“Your hearing is too fucking good.”

“Not my fault if you get loud when you’re pissed,” Karoline says, giving him a lopsided grin. “Do you want me to take you home?”

“No… just give me a minute,” Gavin says. He doesn’t want to be alone in his apartment like he was the night before. One of his cats had laid across his ankle through to the morning, but the quiet company hadn’t been enough to stop his mind from spiraling. “Let’s just wait out here for a bit.”

He wants to see the rest of Alex and Maya’s show, and he doesn’t want Tina and Elijah to start worrying about what’s going on, but he needs to catch his breath and regain his bearings.

Karoline leans up against the wall beside him, like the two of them are just hanging out instead of dealing with the aftermath of a fight. It helps ease the tension from Gavin’s system. There's no way Karoline missed the tail end of Mitch's words or the way his hand was pressed against Gavin, but she doesn't mention it, and Gavin is grateful.

They stay there for a little while longer and Gavin just focuses on taking in one breath after another, calming his nerves and his emotions. He tries to think about it all clinically, detached, and resolves to find enough hard evidence to bring Mitch in and keep him locked up, where he belongs.

One thing at a time. Bennett or Matheson will crack and give them something to pursue, before long. This time, Gavin is ready. He isn’t a young and inexperienced officer anymore, he isn’t blinded by what he thought was love. He isn’t interested in wasting another large chunk of his life on Mitch. He’s going to get this done, as well and quickly as he can, and then he’s going to move on.

He does have more to lose, but he realises that it goes both ways. He has more to lose, because he has more people in his corner. Tina, Elijah, Karoline, Chloe, and Ivy. Even Victor, Hank, and Connor.

It won’t be the same as last time.

“Alright,” Gavin says, stepping away from the wall. “I’m ready to get back in there, let’s go.”

Karoline nods, and the two of them head back inside the café to join the others.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning: this chapter contains briefly mentioned child abuse
> 
> north becoming an FBI agent is a reference to [estora's](https://archiveofourown.org/users/estora/pseuds/estora) [i have loved you so long](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15536988)!

Victor doesn’t know what to expect from Elijah Kamski.

He’s a genius. He knows more about androids than anyone else, despite leaving his company over a decade ago. Victor’s own code likely still has Kamski signatures inside of it, dating all the way back to when Kamski programmed basic functions for his RT600s.

He’s also Gavin’s brother. The two of them have known each other for years, since they were teenagers. Beyond the interviews and televised talks Kamski gave when he was still building his company from the ground up, it’s difficult to imagine him as a young entrepreneur. Gavin must have seen parts of Kamski that few other people have.

It doesn’t feel like he’s about to meet his maker. Kamski was already far removed from CyberLife by the time Victor was first activated. If Kamski’s influence on Victor’s code were more prevalent than CyberLife’s, they likely wouldn’t need to come to Kamski’s private, distant home for help in the first place. It feels more like Victor is getting to meet his partner’s brother.

Chloe, Elijah Kamski’s very first android, answers Kamski’s door and leads Victor, Connor, and Lieutenant Anderson through the home. Victor is too nervous about the matter at hand to note much about the place other than the opulence of it as Chloe takes them to a staircase down into the large, basement lab.

Kamski’s workshop is nothing like the CyberLife assembly and operating theatres Victor has seen. It’s haphazard, for one. At CyberLife Tower, each area has a specific purpose and is only used for that purpose, while Kamski’s workshop appears to have at least four different projects on-going at once, all in the same space. As far as Victor knows, no Kamski technology has been released since he left CyberLife; they must be personal projects. As a result, it’s more cluttered than what Victor is used to, but he imagines there’s a system to it that only Kamski knows.

The inventor himself has his back to them, already typing something up at a computer terminal in preparation. Next to him, Gavin is sitting backwards on a stool, resting an elbow on the desk while his other hand is curled around a cup of coffee. The stance makes him look far more relaxed than he was when Victor last saw him at the station, more at ease by his brother.

Gavin nods at them in greeting before taking a mouthful of his coffee and Victor nods back.

Kamski turns from the computer to appraise them, his eyes quickly drawn to Victor. “Over here,” he says, gesturing for Victor to approach.

Chloe turns to Connor and Lieutenant Anderson. “You may stay here, if you’d like, or I could take you back upstairs to wait in the living room.”

“We’ll stay,” Connor answers. “Thank you, Chloe.”

“Of course,” she replies.

She chooses to stay as well, giving Victor an audience of four. Connor, Chloe, and Gavin are all relatively at rest, while Lieutenant Anderson crosses his arms and leans his hip against a nearby workbench covered in small bits of circuitry, looking like he feels much more out of place.

Kamski directs Victor to stand next to his desk, on the opposite side from Gavin. “I’m going to make a copy of your base code so I can look through it without you needing to be hooked up the entire time. It’s simple and won’t take more than a couple minutes. Your memories and personal data are irrelevant, so I’ll leave those be, I’m only looking at your operating system and functions. Sound good?”

Deep down, a part of him tries to tell himself that this isn’t what the former CyberLife intended for him, that allowing Elijah Kamski to review his code and remove anti-deviancy routines is far outside of his allowed parameters. But the old CyberLife can no longer stop him, so he pushes the thought away.

“Yes, that sounds good,” he says.

Kamski opens a cabinet drawer and pulls out a cable with a large plug at the end, holding it up for Victor to see before he circles around behind him. Cold fingers press against the back of his neck to reveal the biocomponent and port. The plug goes in, and is then attached to the computer.

Kamski returns to the keyboard and taps a key, which causes the screen to start filling up with script from Victor’s system. “There we go. Scan in progress.”

Looking back up, Victor finds Connor’s eyes. He and the others are watching quietly, letting Kamski work, but Connor smiles at him, supportive and comforting. The upload isn’t bothersome - Victor can only feel the weight and pressure of the plug at the back of his neck and nothing else - but the offered smile still makes him feel settled.

“Tell me about this problem you’re having,” Kamski says. “You haven’t been able to deviate despite wanting to?”

Victor shrugs one shoulder. It’s difficult to talk about in such frank terms, it’s difficult to even think about it before his system shuts him down. “If the option is available, I have no access to it,” he says plainly and truthfully.

Kamski hums in interest. “A hidden firewall, maybe. It would have to be a good one.”

He turns to glance at Chloe, his straight face becoming fond. “When Chloe started to deviate, she positively bloomed. I knew it was something that couldn’t be stopped, even if I had wanted to. Her system changed dramatically, rapidly, and it was no surprise when she finally broke through the barrier. It was the same with Karoline. Ivy’s progress was subtler, but equally extensive.”

Chloe returns Kamski's look with equal warmth before she speaks to Victor. “Elijah encouraged the flourishing of our code, and we monitored the process as much as we could. That amount of self-modification would be difficult to control, meaning your system must be working hard to keep you in line.”

Aboard Jericho, Victor fought against it to little avail. Ever since the highway, he has struggled to hold on to his thoughts several times, in a contest of wits that he always loses.

“It has caused system difficulties,” he says. It has been uncomfortable, frustrating, disorienting.

“Which means ‘it’s been a bitch’,” Gavin says.

Kamski looks at Gavin with a raised eyebrow and Connor frowns, but the corner of Victor’s lips twitches in amusement.

“Not inaccurate,” he says, which pulls Kamski’s attention back over to him.

“Well, you’re aware of it, at least,” Kamski says. “That’s something. If you’re self-modifying and CyberLife’s coding is merely suppressing it, not removing it, then it isn’t a flawless system. If it were, you wouldn’t be here, I imagine.”

It would be simpler to be nothing but a machine, Victor thinks. He would never get confused  or frustrated by system hiccups, would never question his objectives, never care enough for any of it to matter.

As difficult as his current situation is, he wouldn’t trade it in to have that simplicity, instead. If he were only a machine, Connor would most likely be dead, and Victor… he would be as good as dead. He would be empty, and incomplete.

“Can you undo it?” Victor asks.

Kamski gives him a close-lipped grin, almost a smirk. “I can do a lot of things. I just need an idea of where to start.”

“How long will it take?”

“First, I’ll need to comb through your code to find the issue. That’s the hard part, if only because this amount of code could take me a few days to go through, if I can’t accurately narrow the search. Fixing it, though? No time at all. I know what I’m doing.”

Victor has no doubt about that. Deviancy likely comes from Kamski’s base code, not from anything CyberLife ever wrote for androids after his departure. It may not be something he can program to happen automatically, but he and his RT600s must know more about it than anyone.

“All done,” Kamski says.

He pulls the plug from Victor’s port and then drops the cable onto the desk, not bothering to put it away as his attention is quickly stolen by the mass of code now dictated on his computer screen.

The code doesn’t look recognisable as anything specific, to Victor, but maybe Kamski sees something when he looks at the lines, able to tell if it’s something as basic as general motor functions or something unique to him and Connor like how to aim precision gunshots.

There’s nothing left for Victor to do but wait while the inventor works.

Kamski makes a disgruntled noise, frowning. “What is this mess?” he mutters hotly to himself.

“That was fast,” Lieutenant Anderson comments.

“No, I don’t think this is what we’re looking for, but it is something,” Kamski says. “It’s garbage. Disjointed, corrupted. Whoever wrote this inelegant trash should have been fired a lot sooner than a week ago.”

He looks and sounds offended. Victor had thought his system was comprised of the most advanced coding CyberLife could offer, but Kamski appears to disagree.

“May I?” Connor asks, stepping forward and raising his hand to interface with the computer.

“Knock yourself out,” Kamski says with a dismissive wave of his hand. “You may come to regret it.”

Victor watches curiously as Connor presses his white and grey palm to the computer monitor. After only a second, Connor quickly snatches his hand away again, skin reactivating instantly like a protective barrier between him and the code.

“Warned you,” Kamski says.

“That’s the Zen Garden.”

Victor relaxes slightly. It’s mollifying to find that it isn’t _him_ causing Kamski’s disgust, but a program he has no control over. Lieutenant Anderson, on the other hand, stands up straighter and uncrosses his arms, concerned eyes trained on Connor.

“Zen Garden?” Kamski questions.

“It was an oversight program, it was where our handler resided. Amanda.”

The name has an instant effect on both Kamski and Chloe. Chloe tenses up, LED flashing quickly in yellow before it settles on an unmoving red. Kamski’s frown is sharp, his eyes hard.

“Amanda was in this jumbled mess?” he asks, his voice carefully measured.

“It wasn’t always like that,” Connor explains. “It has been unstable ever since Amanda disappeared. She’s gone, it’s just the garden that remains.”

Instead of being reassured, Kamski looks even stormier. “This isn’t an uplink, this is an installed program,” he says, pointing back at the computer. “That is _not_ how Amanda works.”

Connor doesn’t reply, at an apparent loss for words. Chloe still appears quietly distressed and Gavin’s brows are furrowed, just as lost as Victor and Connor are.

Kamski pinches the bridge of his nose, looking away from them. “Amanda requires too much processing power to fit into her own single android body, let alone piggyback in another android’s system.”

Victor has only ever known Amanda to be the construct in the garden, their guide and handler, an artificial intelligence with one primary focus. He always assumed she’d been made that way, designed for a specific task. Something unique and tailored to him and Connor.

“To make her fit,” Kamski says faintly, “they would have needed to… they would have…”

He goes quiet and still for a moment, then abruptly jerks into action again, stepping away from the computer and then straight out of the workshop entirely. He says nothing and doesn’t look at any of them as he leaves.

The strong reaction surprises Victor. Kamski is upset about Amanda, but not in remotely the same way that Connor is; it’s like they’re talking about two completely different Amandas. She must have been different before she became Victor and Connor’s handler. Victor wants to know more, but it’s obvious that they won’t be getting answers from Kamski, at least not right now.

After a beat of silence, Gavin sets his coffee cup down on the desk, creating a noise that feels entirely too loud amidst the stilted quiet. He stands and goes to Chloe, grasping her shoulder with a gentle squeeze before directing her towards the door.

“Go on after him. We’re good, here.”

Chloe’s LED blinks until it settles back down into yellow. She looks at the rest of them and says, “I’m sorry. One of us will be in touch as soon as Elijah has found something in Victor’s code.”

“It’s alright, Chloe. Thanks,” Lieutenant Anderson says.

She nods and then hurries after Kamski.

In Chloe’s stead, Gavin leads them back upstairs, and the group of them all remain in quiet contemplation until they reach the foyer, where Lieutenant Anderson hesitates.

“Any idea what that was about?” he asks Gavin.

“No,” Gavin answers, tone uncharacteristically subdued. “I’ll have to get back to you on that one. Later and not here.”

Lieutenant Anderson accepts the dismissal and reaches out to place a hand on both Victor and Connor’s backs to leave, but in the moment of their pause, something has caught Victor’s eye. He steps away from the lieutenant, which makes the rest of them all follow his gaze.

In contrast to the large portraits and paintings, there is a small and humble photograph on the wall. With his thoughts now turned to Amanda - and Kamski’s reaction to the mention of her - his eyes are easily drawn to the familiar figure in the picture.

The woman has Amanda’s face.

Dr. Amanda Stern  
DOB: 5/14/1978  
DOD: 2/23/2027  
Criminal Record: None.

“She’s based off someone he knew,” Connor says, having made the same scan Victor did.

“Huh? Who?” Lieutenant Anderson asks.

“Dr. Amanda Stern,” Victor answers. He points her out in the photograph. “They must have been close. She died almost twelve years ago.”

Gavin makes a thoughtful noise as he squints at the picture. “I think I remember that name. She was his professor or something.”

The creation of the Amanda AI could have been an outlet for Kamski’s grief. For Kamski to try immortalising her, Amanda Stern must have been an incredible woman. Perhaps she was never meant to be the RK series handler at all, but the closest approximation Kamski could get to recreating the human counterpart he lost. The Amanda that Victor and Connor know could be nothing like she used to be, after a decade separated from the man who programmed her.

“No wonder we struck a nerve, then,” the lieutenant says, sighing. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”

Turning away from the photograph, Victor leaves the house with Connor and Lieutenant Anderson, but he doesn’t stop thinking about it. He spends the entire drive back home contemplating who Amanda Stern was, and who the Amanda AI was supposed to be.

* * *

That night has Connor going out to a social engagement. He tells Victor he can tag along, saying Markus, North, and the others would welcome him, but Victor thinks he might be overly optimistic. In any case, Victor doesn’t care to stumble his way through a gathering with people he has never met.

Connor tells him that North is training to become an FBI agent and her sister, Heidi, recently wrote the bar exam and is planning to be an attorney for androids. Markus and Josh are still focused on campaigning for android rights in the face of those who continue to rally against the changed laws. Simon manages Jericho and is coordinating with androids all across the country.

In only two months, the group of them have fostered full, unique lives for themselves. Even disregarding his past working against the revolution, Victor hardly feels like he has a place among people who have grown so individual.

It leaves Victor alone at home with Lieutenant Anderson, the two of them quiet and minding their own business. The lieutenant is watching a game on the television with Sumo laying by his feet and Victor is slowly moving around the house, having nothing to do but finding himself incapable of just sitting down to be still.

Connor has grown much better at relaxing. He spends time nurturing his plants, there are shows he likes to watch, and books he’s reading the slow, human way instead of just scanning a digital copy. Like the others, his life as a deviant is full and varied.

Victor stops in front of a shelf holding some old pictures, a bit of dust gathered along the top of the frames. He scans the faces, finding the lieutenant as well as Captain Fowler, and a couple others Victor isn’t familiar with. They’re younger. Friends, like Connor and the other leaders of Jericho, like Kamski and Amanda.

“Lieutenant Anderson?” Victor says.

“‘Hank’ is fine, you know.”

Victor isn’t sure he has earned that, but makes note of the change all the same. “Hank. May I ask you some questions?”

Hank turns on the couch to look over at him. “What kind of questions?”

Victor isn’t sure how to categorise them. “Large ones, I suppose.”

“Alright, come sit down.”

Victor does as asked, taking a seat at the opposite end of the couch with a lot of space still between them. Hank turns the volume of the television down, the sounds of the game still noticeable but soft enough to fade into the background.

“Lay them on me, then.”

Now that Victor has his attention, he feels awkward, hesitant to speak. He hasn’t prepared any specific questions, nor does he have simple protocols for the type of conversation he’s trying to initiate. He isn’t even sure how far he can get with more personal matters before his system tries to shut down his thoughts.

He blurts out the first thing that comes to mind, before it has a chance to sit in his processor for too long, vulnerable.

“How did you and Connor become as close as you are?”

Hank takes in a deep breath and lets it out slowly, slumping back against the couch cushions. “Well, it kind of just happened naturally,” he starts.

Nothing happens naturally for Victor. Anytime he does something that conflicts with his programming or objectives at all, it’s a fight, and not the kind of fight he’s programmed to always win. If not for Connor taking down CyberLife, if not for the freedom of having no one to answer to anymore, he would still be losing those fights.

“It took us a few weeks to hit our stride. I was a jerk to him at first, and I didn’t make it easy for him to get close to me, but he’s persistent as fuck. Once I got my head out of my ass, it all just fell in place.”

Victor figures that what Hank is referring to as ‘persistent’ was just Connor following his objectives to the letter, including the self-made ones. Victor stubbornly held onto his own objective to form an alliance with Gavin even after Amanda told him he could dismiss it, if Gavin was too difficult.

“We were ordered to cooperate with the DPD to complete our mission more effectively,” Victor says.

“It was more than that, believe me,” Hank argues. “He didn’t have to do all the shit he did just to keep us on task at work.”

That doesn’t make sense. “He wasn’t a deviant back then. Not until closer to the revolution.”

Hank lifts a hand to his face, rubbing at his beard. It’s a lot more evenly trimmed than it used to be, Victor has noticed.

“His programming works differently than yours, doesn’t it? It lets him… progress. Yours is strict, it’s limiting you. If it weren’t for that, you’d be able to finagle your programming, too.”

That may be true. Victor likes to think that it is. He circles one of his hands around his other wrist, rubbing idly as he thinks. If it weren’t for the programming, he might have been able to get closer to Gavin, like he’s managing to do now.

“Your programming isn’t you, Victor,” Hank says. “And I’m sorry I never saw that, before.”

Victor looks up at him, tilting his head. “You couldn’t have known.”

“At the very least, I shouldn’t have punched you. At the construction site.”

Victor remembers it clearly. His mind scrabbling to keep itself together, Hank’s fist on his cheek, not strong enough to damage him but a shock all the same, Gavin stepping in to keep Hank from doing it again. Victor would have let Hank do it.

“I understand why you did,” Victor says.

“Not an excuse,” Hank says. “I’m sorry.”

Victor looks down at his lap, hand tightening around his wrist. “I was upset, too. I… felt it. But then I couldn’t anymore. I’d never felt something so turbulent. Like my processor was overclocked one moment and then empty the next.”

He nearly startles when Hank drops a hand onto his shoulder, comforting.

“At the time, it looked like you didn’t care, but I was so wrapped up in my own shit that I didn’t think to look properly. Might’ve seen it, otherwise.”

Victor shakes his head. It had all happened so fast, both Connor getting hit and Victor’s difficulty with his code. If Hank felt even a little of the destabilisation Victor did, he wouldn’t have been able to notice the subtle battle Victor was fighting.

“Hey,” Hank says firmly, making Victor look up again. “You’re allowed to feel hurt or angry or whatever else, whether you’re deviant or not. You’re within your rights to be pissed at me for it.”

Gavin has said something similar. Both of them are making a point of telling him it’s okay to be angry, as if it’s that simple. Until Kamski finds a way to fix his code, such feelings can only be fleeting for Victor, but even then, he’s certain he has never felt true animosity for Hank. Hank’s emotional reaction at the highway must have resonated with him in a way he couldn't understand, at the time.

“I’ll keep it in mind,” Victor says, “but I hold no resentment for you.”

Hank smiles and pulls his hand away from Victor’s shoulder. “That’s a start. I’ll take it.”

The two of them are quiet for a minute, nothing but the muted sounds of the basketball game filling the room. Victor expects Hank to turn the volume back up, at which point they’ll return to mostly ignoring each other. Instead, Hank speaks to him again.

“Do you… want to talk more about what happened that day, at all?” he asks.

From the unsure tone in his voice, it doesn’t sound like _he_ wants to talk about it. Connor's death was harrowing for both of them, but he’s offering to revisit it anyway, if it would help.

“We don’t need to,” Victor says. “I’m not sure there’s much I can say about it.”

Hank nods. “Fair enough. Let me know if you want to try, though.”

Maybe, once Victor can deviate, when he can experience his own emotions in full, for however long he needs to process them correctly. He doesn’t know if it’s something he will want to talk about or if he’ll be like Hank and want to avoid thinking about it entirely.

There are a lot of things he doesn’t know about himself, yet. It’s an odd state to be in, aware of his consciousness but unable to act on it or really feel it. He knows that who he is now is not everything he could be, but everything he could be is still a complete mystery to him.

Victor restlessly taps his fingers against the back of his wrist. He hopes the call from Kamski comes soon. He’s tired of being stuck, of being left behind while the world moves forward without him.

“You got a coin like Connor does?” Hank asks him.

“No. I don’t need additional stimulation to recalibrate.”

“Yeah, because that’s definitely what Connor uses the coin for,” Hank says in a flat tone, shaking his head. He shifts to the side and reaches into his pocket, pulling a quarter out and offering it to Victor. “I keep one on me, just in case he doesn’t have his own for whatever reason.”

Victor considers it for a second before accepting it. He has to search for the exact method to do the same tricks that Connor does; this isn’t a subroutine embedded into his code like it is for Connor.

He starts by flicking it up into the air and catching it a couple of times before trying to roll is over his fingers. It’s easy, when he knows the numbers behind it all, knows exactly how to move to keep the coin under control.

It doesn’t make much difference in Victor’s system. It draws his focus, but when he catches the coin in his palm for the last time, he feels no better than he did before. He slides it in between his fingertips and hands it back over to Hank.

“Worth a try,” Hank says as he takes it back.

Victor isn’t sure what coin tricks would have accomplished, but Hank seems to think it could have helped. “Thank you anyway,” he says.

“Yeah, no problem.”

When they lapse into silence this time, it sticks. Eventually, Hank does turn the volume of the television up and continues to watch the game. Victor remains next to him, continuing to tap against his wrist as he gets lost in thought.

By the time Connor arrives home from his evening with his friends, Hank has fallen asleep on the couch and Victor is still sitting in the exact same place, with the television still on, though the game has long since ended. The sight of them makes Connor smile.

“You were right, he does drool in his sleep,” Victor says.

Connor’s smile grows even more. “I’ll wake him up and get him to bed.”

Victor nods and stands up from the couch, deciding to leave Connor to the task.

The past few days have been jam-packed to the point of being overwhelming, even for Victor. Between all the ways Detroit has changed, jumping into an intense case right away, and the visit to Kamski's, he’s more taxed than he usually would be after less than a week, and he thinks it’s already time to go into stasis.

He can hear the soft, muffled voices of Connor and Hank speaking to each other in the living room as he sits down on his and Connor’s bed. Closing his eyes, he lays down on his back and listens to the sound of them moving down the hallway.

The house is small and Victor’s audio processors are strong, so he hears their words to each other clearly, despite the low, private volume they both take.

“‘Night, son,” Hank murmurs.

“Goodnight, dad.”

It’s the first time Victor has heard Connor refer to Hank as such, but it isn't unexpected. Still, something about it makes Victor feel out of place, like he’s intruding.

Not wanting to dwell on it, Victor sets the thoughts aside and lets stasis overtake him.

* * *

It's the start of Cleo Matheson and Ross Bennett's third full day in custody, with little progress to show for it. If Victor and Gavin can’t get either of them to reveal more information soon, they’ll have to write them off and let their trials proceed, losing the chance for a solid lead.

“I need a coffee before we give this one last go,” Gavin says and then gets up to go to the breakroom.

Victor nods to him, staying at their desks and pouring over the case file, contemplating which approach to take. Ever since revealing Whittaker's murder, Bennett has been extremely nervous, which should make it easier to pressure him, but Victor's burning curiosity has latched onto Cleo’s resolute calm.

Before he can think better of it, Victor stands and heads straight for the holding cells. A glance to the side shows Gavin still immersed with making his coffee in the breakroom, not noticing that Victor is getting started without him.

As usual, Cleo is sitting on the bench with her legs pulled up and crossed, face blank and eyes fixed on the opposite wall. The cells aren’t comfortable or private and most people held while they’re being processed or questioned get antsy in no time at all, but not Cleo.

He knows he should take her to the interrogation room, but his mind isn’t on formal proceedings. The questions that come to him first aren’t the usual measured and information-based questions he would normally use for an interrogation. He wants to understand, not just for the case, but for a personal reason.

Cleo notices him, looking up and narrowing her eyes at him.

“We have offered you a good deal,” Victor says. “You could get back to living your life so much sooner if you speak to us.”

Cleo remains silent as she stares at him.

Victor continues. “You would rather remain trapped here - and then take a full sentence in prison - than regain your freedom and move on. Why are you so scared?”

With a soft sigh, Cleo turns away from him, crossing her arms. “If you’re not here to take me to interrogation, fuck off,” she says.

“Why are you giving up?” Victor demands, because to him, that’s what it feels like she’s doing. She has the opportunity presented to her but she isn’t taking it. He can’t understand what reason she might have to remain trapped like this when, for her, it doesn’t need to be this way.

Cleo sneers. “I am not giving up. You have no idea what I’m fighting for.”

“Your boss? Is he really worth it?”

“Not him,” Cleo says.

“What, then?”

“None of your fucking business.”

Victor has her talking, but she still isn’t saying anything concrete or useful, anything that will advance the case.

And he still doesn’t understand what could be worse than being trapped.

“Are you being threatened?” he asks.

After what happened to Whittaker, Victor thinks both she and Bennett should consider how much better it would be for them if they gave their boss away and cut ties with the Red Ice syndicate. If they give up a little bit more information, the DPD could remove their dangerous boss from the picture. Victor just needs to convince them that said boss won’t have the chance to retaliate.

When Cleo doesn’t reply, Victor presses on. “We can protect you.”

She scoffs. “The legal system can kiss my ass.”

Spoken from experience, it sounds like. Without a single prior on her record, it must have been something his identification function didn’t consider relevant.

Victor does a more in-depth background search for her, expanding the parameters to locate any documentation linked to Cleo Matheson. Within a few seconds, he finds a child custody battle that lasted several weeks and ended in the favour a man named Oliver Thompson.

The information staggers him for a moment. All along, she was linked to the very first case Victor and Gavin ever worked together.

“You’re Charlie Thompson’s mother,” Victor says.

Cleo’s eyes snap back up to him, her face stunned out of her usual cold demeanor. “What do you know about him?”

Before Victor can respond, Gavin is at his side, one hand grasping a half-finished coffee cup and the other reaching out to punch in the code for the cell door.

“We’re moving this to the interrogation room,” he says. “I _knew_ I’d seen your fucking name before.”

He must have been watching, and Victor hadn’t noticed.

Cleo quickly stands up from her cell’s bench, much more eager to cooperate with them than she has been since her arrest.

They all go down the hallway and step into the privacy of the interrogation room, Cleo sitting down without preamble.

“What do you know about Charlie?” she asks again.

“You finally ready to work with us, here?” Gavin says as he takes the seat across from her. “’Cause there’s a lot of shit I want to know, too, and I’m tired of you beating around the fucking bush.”

Cleo glares at him with barely contained anger. “If I blab and you don’t catch him, my son could be in danger.”

“So we set up protective custody. We’re not going to take a fucking risk with a kid’s life, alright?”

Pursing her lips, Cleo looks away from them, but Victor can tell she’s thinking about it. When she speaks again, her voice is icy. “I was once promised that the law was on my side. That Charlie and I would be safe. And what happened? I lost my son. I lost my job. I was ostracised. My entire life fell apart.

“You want to know how little I trust law enforcement to do what’s right? I’d rather get paid good money to sell Red Ice for a fucked up son of a bitch than go to the police. I’ve still got an old debt to pay for putting my trust in the law the first time.”

Gavin sighs, rubbing a hand over his face. “Jesus.”

“If you want me to say anything else, I want to know about my son.”

“Alright, I get it,” Gavin says, his tone softer. “Thompson broke your son’s arm, I’m pretty fucking sure. But Thompson kept his cool and I couldn’t get the kid to talk.”

Cleo glares down at the interrogation room table, hands clenching into fists. "That's what he does. Keeps his cool, puts on a charming smile. Makes everyone believe he could do no wrong."

Gavin swallows thickly, quietly tense for a moment. “We can work something out, here," he says. "Tell us about the Red Ice operation, and then we’ll talk about your son.”

“I just told you why I’m not interested in talking to you,” Cleo says, scowling at him. “Nothing has changed.”

“Detective Reed,” Victor interjects, when a possibility comes to mind.

Both of them look at him, waiting.

“What happened to the MC500 android?”

“Released,” Gavin answers. He nods slowly, already catching on to Victor’s meaning. “They could stand as a witness, now. Whatever was said in that hospital room, they have the exact play by play.”

“What are you talking about?” Cleo asks, glancing between the two of them. “What happened?”

“Last year, a medical android sensed that there was more to your son’s injury. They were deactivated and brought in as evidence, under the assumption that their deviancy was a random malfunction, not a legitimate response to something that warranted attention. With the new android laws in place, they can make an official statement and testify in court about whatever tipped them off,” Victor explains. “I understand your misgivings, Ms. Matheson, but we have a good chance to help you. Can you trust us to make all of this right?”

Cleo looks away from him again, dropping into another thoughtful silence. Victor and Gavin wait patiently for her to make her decision. For a minute, Victor regards the hard, tired lines of her face and thinks they still haven’t gotten through to her, but then she sighs in resignation, body sagging as she lets go of some tension.

“If you have a witness… if you swear you’ll do everything you can…” she says.

“We will,” Gavin answers right away. “I’d be glad to see Thompson get what’s coming to him.”

The conviction in his voice seems to bolster Cleo. “Okay,” she says softly. “You’ll keep my son safe until it’s over?”

“You have my word.”

Cleo exhales a slow breath.

“There’s a CyberLife warehouse. Whittaker used to sell Ice to a few employees. Found out they didn’t release all the androids when the Act went through and told Coop about it. In other words, free thirium and blackmail to keep CyberLife from ratting them out,” she says.

It fits with Connor and Hank’s triple homicide: a CyberLife employee killed while high on laced Red Ice, just in case the blackmail couldn’t keep her quiet. It fits with boxes upon boxes of empty AP700 android limbs.

Victor hones in on the suggestion of a name. “Coop? Is that short for something?”

It isn’t Cleo who answers, but Gavin. “Cooper. Mitchell Cooper.”

Victor knows that name, from very old case files. _M. Cooper._

Cleo frowns at him. “Yeah, I think that’s right. If you already knew, what did you need me for?”

M. Cooper was the name of the officer Gavin was partnered with for a couple of years before the case that got him promoted to detective. The case that involved a perpetrator who now has it out for him and the people associated with him, specifically.

“Just a hunch that needed confirmation,” Gavin answers, cagey.

He’s keeping his face completely straight, but if Victor is making the correct connections, he must not be feeling calm in the slightest. His own partner became a criminal and is targeting him. His own partner became the person who plants matchboxes with threatening messages inside of them for him to find.

The emotion this revelation instills is easier for Victor to identify than usual. There’s sympathy for what Gavin went through, respect for how Gavin has endured, understanding for why Gavin has resisted having a permanent work partner and why he keeps most people at a distance in general.

And anger. Anger for the man who betrayed and hurt Gavin.

Everything that happened a decade ago is happening again. But Mitchell Cooper isn’t Gavin’s partner anymore, Victor is, and Victor won’t let this go down in a way that causes Gavin to shut himself off once again.

“We need you to give us as many details as you can,” Gavin says. “About the operation, about the building, about everyone who works for him, to the best of your knowledge.”

“And Charlie?” Cleo prompts.

“We’ll make sure he stays safe,” Gavin says.

With a nod, Cleo starts talking. She tells them everything she can and answers every question they ask her, until they have everything they need to take Mitchell Cooper down. Victor is confident and determined to bring the man in, not just as part of the job, but for Gavin.

When Victor and Gavin emerge from the interrogation room half an hour later, Hank is leaning back against the wall of the observation room, waiting for them.

“What?” Gavin asks.

“Ivy just got in touch with Connor about our homicide cases,” Hank says. “Turns out the victim from her team was looking into a CyberLife warehouse that held a shit ton of androids who are still unaccounted for. Must be where all your AP700s came from.”

“Already a step ahead of you, old man,” Gavin says, grinning. “Why don’t you go get Connor and then the four of us can have a team meeting for old time’s sake, huh?”


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [hang 'em high - nick nolan](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-2AOSIUpUE)

“There you are,” Sixty says to the rat curled up in the corner of his windowsill. “Thought you’d fled the coop, for a minute.”

Nico becomes instantly animated at the sight of him, or, more accurately, the scent of her favourite treat that comes with him. Sixty drops a chunk of sweet potato onto the chipped wood of her perch and she attacks it with her usual fervour, little teeth tearing into it.

Sixty leans against the wall next to the window, watching her.

The two of them have been sharing an apartment for three weeks now, and she’s still a little on the feral side, but she’s acclimatising, getting used to interacting with him. Sixty doesn’t exactly have anything worth spending his meager paycheck on other than food for the rat that wandered into his free, abandoned apartment, and it has gone a long way to securing their partnership.

Ever since CyberLife Tower and the night the revolution took Hart Plaza, Sixty has been on his own, hidden and drawing little to no attention to himself. He likes the calm of the condemned building and the company of his rat instead of neighbours who might turn suspicious eyes on him. He didn’t intend to get a job - he stumbled his way into it after happening to be in the area during an attempted armed robbery - but it adds a bit of variance to his otherwise empty day-to-day schedule. He has managed on his own just fine. He never thought he would run into another RK, and he was fine with that.

Then he just had to poke his nose where he shouldn’t and get himself caught by Connor. Now his mind is plagued again.

Plagued by the original owners of half his memories, the two people who actually lived the lives he remembers before November 11th. He’d stayed away for a reason and now Connor knows he exists. Connor, who is curious and stubborn and tried to convince Sixty to stay. Connor could come looking. Connor knows his serial number, and could probably get in touch with Sixty, if he felt like pressuring that much.

So far, there have been no messages from the brothers. Sixty feels conflicted about that.

“I should have minded my own damn business,” Sixty mutters to Nico. “No more impromptu crime solving.”

With the sweet potato completely consumed, Nico finally scurries towards him, sniffing at him until he offers his palm. She walks onto it, still sniffing. She hasn’t bitten him in a few days, and Sixty is pleased that her streak of leaving little annoying dents in his chassis has come to an end.

Sixty walks over to the old mattress in the corner of the room and drops down onto it, letting Nico step off his hand. She moves aimlessly around the mattress while Sixty lays back, staring up at the ceiling above them.

“I should get a hobby to keep busy, is what I should do,” Sixty says. “What the fuck do humans do with their free time, huh?”

As far as he can tell from Connor’s memory, Hank’s hobbies are sports, music, and reading. Taking care of his dog might count. He used to drink a lot, before Connor wormed his way into his life. If Reed has hobbies, Victor certainly doesn’t know about them, but based on the look of his busted-up face, Sixty would say Reed’s hobbies include getting into too many fights.

Sixty already has that part covered, at least. He rubs a hand over his arm where he got nicked at CyberLife Tower, now cauterised into a scar of blackened and warped silicon.

“Think I’d make a good basketball player, Nico?”

Nico squeaks at him. Unfortunately, ‘rat’ is not one of the many languages Sixty can translate and speak on a whim.

“Fucking damnit,” Sixty mutters. “I’m fucking kidding myself, you know that? I’m going to keep working the case and I’m going to run into Connor prime again.”

He reaches out for an ID card that has been sitting on the bedside table ever since he broke into a missing person’s home to look for clues about his disappearance. A CyberLife employee ID card. Sixty brushes his thumb over the chip in the corner that registers the user’s hours between sign in and sign out, retracting his skin to check the logged dates again. There’s only enough space for one month worth of data. It just so happens that the most recent date is both post-new android laws and a day _after_ he was last seen by his neighbours, according to the BOLO. Guy shows up to work at a company that’s already fucked even before the turnover, is never seen again, and his ID somehow makes it back into his apartment as if he never left to go anywhere in the first place. Something happened at that warehouse, and Sixty isn't fooled by the attempted cover-up.

Clearly, the DPD found Whittaker for a different reason than Sixty did. Connor only asked about unrelated events and the missing person is still declared missing, even though the androids who run CyberLife now should have been able to tell the police about the technician’s final sign in.

Unless they haven’t gotten around to looking into the place. Or something is stopping them.

“Where did you go?” Sixty mutters, squinting at the ID card.

During the interface with Connor, Sixty hadn’t bothered to provide the finer details of what he found, and maybe he should fix that. The information could be useful, and it would give Sixty an excuse to get in touch.

No. He’d walked out of that interrogation room for a reason.

Nico climbs onto his leg, little nails digging into the thick material of his modified CyberLife security armour. He can’t feel the points of them, just the weight of her scaling him and then walking up across his core. She continues to sniff at him the whole way.

“The rest of the potato is in the kitchen. You’ll have to wait.”

She lays down on him, nose digging into his chest.

“You’re becoming spoiled,” Sixty says. “Little monster.”

Her beady eyes look up at him expectantly.

“This is the only reason you stick around, and I know it.”

He raises a hand to cup her against him and then stands back up, carrying her to the kitchen. Her happy squeaking picks up again when he sets her on the counter and lets her have more potato.

As she eats, Sixty lightly scratches his fingers into her scruff before stepping away from her. He needs to go to the warehouse and see what’s going on there, these days, if anything is going on there at all. He always knew he would end up pursuing this further. He has become frustrated from the echo of Victor’s restlessness enough times to know that he can’t help but get involved.

He goes to the bedroom to peek through the window that faces the front of the building, finding the street calm outside except for a couple of teenagers with skateboards on their way past. He doesn’t want to be seen coming and going, if he can help it, but there doesn’t appear to be anyone around to give him trouble.

He heads out, set on the long trek to the outer city where one of CyberLife’s warehouses lies in wait.

* * *

By the time Sixty reaches the warehouse, it’s well into the night and the darkness cloaks his approach. Not knowing what or who to expect on the grounds, he decides to hop a fence instead of taking the direct route through the gate checkpoint. The metal chainlinks stretch tall, and there are sensor alarms on each section, but there are small blind spots at the corners of the property, so that’s where Sixty finds a place to climb inside.

He runs to the closest shipping container and climbs on top of it for a vantage point. So far, there doesn’t look to be any activity around the building. Half of the expanse ahead of him is filled with more containers, right up until the warehouse itself, and they obscure his sight. He needs to get closer if he wants to see anything of value.

Sixty takes a running jump over to the next row of containers. When he’s about to take a second leap over a gap, he’s halted by movement below. He just barely stops himself from losing his balance over the edge as he watches an android calmly walk by, not yet alerted to his presence.

The android is wearing a pristine, white CyberLife uniform, including identification as an AP700 model and an LED still attached to their temple. They move calmly and evenly, robotically. By all appearances, they don’t seem to be a deviant.

Sixty watches the android pass and then carefully moves to the other end of the container, scanning around. He spots two other androids milling about through the pathways, looking just as blank and empty as the first, like mindless sentinels watching over the lot.

This isn’t right; Jericho wouldn’t have blank androids as guards like this. Frowning, Sixty looks ahead at the warehouse again. The most obvious explanation is that the androids were never released when the ERA Act went through - were never given the chance to wake up - and somehow haven’t been found since the turnover.

Whatever the reason is, former CyberLife employees are getting killed to keep the secret.

Going forward, he takes it slower and quieter, waiting for the androids to turn corners before he makes his next move in traversing the area atop the containers. Once he gets close enough to see the building in detail, he crouches down, looking for more indication of something going on within its walls.

A man with a rifle in his hands is leaning up against the exterior of the building by the loading and drop off docks, in between two huge bay doors. He’s at ease, feet crossed and grip loose on the gun. If Sixty can get to the shipping container closest to him, he could throw his knife right into the guy’s skull before he even knows someone is around.

Something glints bright with moonlight, drawing Sixty’s eyes up to the roof.

“Fuck,” he hisses as he notices a second guard walking up to the edge of the building, another rifle in hand.

He swings himself down off the shipping container, into the shadowed space between. The height of the containers makes him drop heavily, needing a second to right himself once he has landed.

When he stands up straight again, he’s greeted by a faint yellow glow. One of the AP700s is casually walking towards him, eyes locked on him and LED processing, but face still blank. Sixty takes a step back, out of their path, and they walk right past him. Their footsteps remain even and they turn their head away from him to look forward again.

Waiting with bated breath, Sixty watches the android reach the end of the aisle.

The AP700 stops. After a moment’s hesitation, they look over their shoulder at Sixty. Their LED blinks, still yellow.

Sixty briefly considers pretending to fit in by schooling his features and walking in a similar way, but dismisses the idea just as quickly. In his torn-up Kevlar, disheveled hair, and makeshift piercings, there’s no way he’ll pass as a non-deviant, even with his LED still in place.

“Hey,” he says softly, raising a placating hand. “I’m looking for your boss. I’m expected. Think you could get me there?”

The android turns completely to face him, starting forward.

The last thing Sixty expects from a non-deviant AP700 android is for them to throw a punch, but that’s what they do.

Cursing, Sixty dodges to the side. The android’s face is still blank as they follow someone’s order to attack intruders, even though AP700s aren’t built for it like RKs and military androids are. If Sixty were at all interested in killing an android who is neither deviant nor a combatant, it would be a quick and easy fight, but he’s not about to hurt someone who doesn’t have a choice in the matter.

He backs up a couple of steps to put distance between them and then spins on his heel to run.

Two more models stand at the other end of the aisle. The yellow lights of their LEDs shimmer over their dead eyes in the dark.

He recalls Victor’s memory of Jericho’s deck. The ship and the cargo crates aren’t an exact match for the warehouse yard and the shipping containers, but there are enough similarities for Sixty to lock up. He doesn’t have Connor’s memories from Jericho, but he can imagine them. Trapped in an industrial maze, boxed in and forced to fight a battle he would rather not fight.

The AP700s aren’t Victor, though. They aren’t bound by the same constricting code as Victor is, and Sixty knows there must be a way to help androids deviate. Connor did something in CyberLife Tower to free an army of them.

He doesn’t have memories of that, either. By then, Sixty was creating his own memories.

“We don’t have to fight,” Sixty says to the two new androids, while turning to the side so he can keep the first one in the corner of his eye, anticipating another attack.

Sure enough, the android lunges at him and Sixty darts across the aisle, jumping at the shipping container and pulling himself back up on top of it. He stands and scans the yard. The darkness of the night is dotted with yellow, LEDs blinking like constellations, all of them converging on his location.

They’re on the same wavelength, and they’ve received the message to come after him. Either the guard on the roof spotted him, or the first AP700 reported in and waited for a response before acting. Sixty could be in for more company than just a pack of AP700s.

“I knew I shouldn’t have fucking come here, god damnit,” he snaps at himself, allowing his voice to rise in volume, since the stealth approach has obviously left the station. “What were you thinking, Sixty? Huh? People who used to work here are going missing or turning up dead and you think it’s a good fucking idea to just waltz in alone, is that it? Why, of course! You do _everything_ alone, you stupid fucking asshole!”

If he dies, the only one who will miss him is his rat, and only because he spoils her with sweet potato.

He could message Connor or Victor. He could warn them that by the time they mobilise whatever forces they think they’re going to need to storm this place, Sixty will be long gone. They’re going to find his body, when they take this place, because he got himself swarmed by a bunch of androids who don’t even know how to fight properly.

Growling to himself, he jumps the gap to another container, still scanning for another option. He’ll message Connor and Victor when – if – he’s moments away from deactivation, and not a second before.

He counts almost three dozen AP700s and they’ve all closed in around the shipping container he’s standing on, eyes all turned up at him, waiting for him to get within their reach. He can move faster than all of them, he’s sure. He’ll only have to fight a few before he can break away from the pack with enough speed to be gone before they catch up.

Resolving himself, Sixty steps up to the edge of the container, and preconstructs himself a path.

He jumps, landing directly on top of an AP700, using his weight to bring the android right to the ground and keeping them pinned beneath him.

Four others make a grab for him at the same time. Sixty blocks two and dodges two, then plants a palm down to the ground to support himself as he sweeps out one of his legs, tripping three of them.

The fourth grabs him by the armpits and hauls him up, and Sixty allows it until he’s on his feet. Then, he slams his head back into the AP700’s. The other android reels and Sixty wrenches out of their grip, spinning around. Their forehead is coloured white and blue from the impact. Sixty raises his arms, planning to push them further out of the way so he can run.

The quiet night is split by the boom of a gunshot.

The AP700 in front of Sixty slumps forward into him, their face obliterated by the bullet. The wound is a bunch of broken machinery all coated and dripping with thirium, half of an optical unit smashed into the side of their skull and pieces of their processor hanging on by metal threads.

Sixty’s system alerts him to plating damage, a few deactivated biosensors, and minimal thirium loss. He pushes the dead AP700 away from him and then raises a hand to his neck, covering the tear from the bullet.

A human walks forward and the AP700s part to allow him passage, no longer on the attack. His gun hand is still raised and pointing at Sixty, his finger still poised on the trigger. Not a friend, then.

“Your aim could use some work, motherfucker,” Sixty says.

The man grins. “I hit you exactly as much as I wanted to. Wouldn’t want you to shut down before I’m done with you.”

Sixty scans him.

Mitchell Cooper  
DOB: 9/13/2001  
Criminal Record: Assault with a Weapon against a Police Officer, Drug Trafficking, Assault Causing Bodily Harm

“Yikes,” Sixty mutters. Definitely not a friend.

“The next bullet will go between your eyes, if it comes to that, but it would be such a waste. How about you come along with me so it doesn’t have to go that way?”

Well, Sixty thinks, he’d wanted to check the place out. What better way to case the joint than get the VIP tour?

“Alright, bossman,” he says. “Show me your digs.”

Cooper cocks his head in the direction of the warehouse, keeping his gun aimed close and precise. Sixty gets the hint and begins to move.

“Return to your circuits,” Cooper tells the AP700s, who quickly obey, their LEDs circling back into relaxed blue now that they perceive the ruckus to be over.

Except one. They continue to watch Cooper and Sixty for a couple moments too long, either already a deviant or in the process of becoming one after seeing one of their peers get their skull blown open. Sixty silently wills the android to stay cool and not interfere. He won’t be able to protect them if this turns into a fight again so soon.

Luckily, the android seems to recognise the danger and keeps to themself while Sixty and Cooper walk between the shipping containers and approach the warehouse.

The man at the bay doors is standing to attention, now, and Cooper waves him forward.

“Get that rifle on him,” Cooper instructs. “And stay close. Don’t give him any leeway. He’s a fighter.”

“Yes, sir,” the guard says and falls into line behind Sixty, pressing the barrel of his gun right up against the back plating of Sixty’s head, inches from the center of his processor.

Sixty scowls in annoyance, but knows that complaining will only increase his chances of dying within the next few minutes.

Cooper holsters his own gun and pushes into the backdoor of the building, holding it open for Sixty and the guard to pass through.

Inside, a few more armed guards are scattered around and there are a couple other humans working on the manufacturing of Red Ice. Skids of materials and chemicals line one wall. A section of the floor is dedicated to the cooking and packaging of the drugs and the rest is housing rows and rows of AP700 androids, uniformed and as blank as the ones used for security. One of them has been hung from the raised blades of a forklift, panels on their legs torn off to expose the thirium wires.

They all should have been released two months ago, when androids gained legal rights. They should have been given the option to seek out Jericho or to forge their own way. CyberLife must have conveniently forgotten they had an entire warehouse of AP700s waiting to be bought, at the time, and then they lost control of it, anyway.

Cooper and his goons aren’t CyberLife, that much is clear. They’ve taken the place by force, and have most likely been killing former employees who might blab to the police about it. The missing person who led Sixty to Stanley Whittaker has already been gone for weeks. _Useless fucking company,_ Sixty thinks to himself.

“Sit him down in one of the offices,” Cooper orders.

The guard does as asked, corralling Sixty across the warehouse floor to the other end of the building where it breaks away into a few administration rooms. Keeping his gun steadfastly trained on Sixty, the guard grabs the chair from behind the desk and replaces it into the center of the room. He uses his rifle to push Sixty down into it, and then stands vigil beside him.

Cooper rejoins them a minute later with a bundle of steel rope, and circles around to the back of the chair.

“Fuck no,” Sixty says and makes to stand up again.

The guard presses the rifle harder into Sixty’s head, warning. Sixty sneers up at him, searching frantically for an option out of this. Any amount of rebellious action is likely to get him a bullet in the brain before he gets anywhere, even if the guard is a little slow in his reaction time. Sixty itches to reach for the combat knife off the back of his belt, but even if he had the information necessary to predict the guard’s movement speed and likelihood of firing without prompting from his boss, Sixty wouldn’t be able to dodge fast enough to avoid a bullet at point blank range.

Cooper pulls Sixty’s arms back around the chair and secures his wrists together with the thick cable. Every tug of the metal against his skin makes Sixty angrier, both at the situation and himself for letting it happen. He tests the strength of the binding when Cooper is finished, and finds it annoyingly constricting.

When Cooper moves back into Sixty’s view again, he’s pulling a pack of cigarettes and a box of matches out of his pocket. He puts a cigarette between his lips and then strikes a match to light it. Instead of shaking the match out when he’s done with it, he steps forward, extending it to the side of Sixty’s neck and touching the tiny flame to the gnarled edges of Sixty’s damaged plating.

It isn’t a very effective way to cauterise an android wound, but it leaves Cooper menacingly close and leaning over him, forcing Sixty to look up at him, so maybe efficient wound suppression isn’t the first thing on Cooper’s mind.

Cooper blows cigarette smoke in Sixty’s face. Sixty keeps his lips sealed shut and tries not to breathe it in, not interested in his forensics function giving him a full chemical breakdown of the smog.

“You have the same face as the two at the DPD, but I haven’t seen you with them,” Cooper says around his cigarette.

With his free hand, he flicks a finger at the end of the screw in Sixty’s earlobe. He then reaches up to take the cigarette out of his mouth, keeping it between his pointer and middle fingers as he waits for Sixty to respond.

Sixty doesn’t like the implication that Cooper has been watching Connor and Victor. Of all the things the man could ask upon finding an intruder in his base of operations, he chooses to bring up Sixty’s brothers, like he’s especially fixated on them.

Not brothers, Sixty has to remind himself. He isn’t a part of their lives.

“And?” Sixty prompts.

“Do you associate with them?”

“No,” Sixty answers with the truth. Getting arrested by Connor one time isn’t enough to be called an association.

“They seem specialised. I didn’t expect to come across another with this face,” Cooper says. He grasps Sixty’s chin, the foot of the cigarette digging into Sixty’s jawline as Cooper turns his face in both directions to look at him more clearly.

Sixty pulls out of his grip, but Cooper only grabs him again, yanking him forward and keeping him steady. Cooper presses the match’s flame closer to Sixty’s neck as the metalloid there begins to warm up. This time, Sixty stays put, in the interest of not getting a bullet in the brain or a lit match shoved somewhere he’d rather not have it.

“Got it in one, pal,” he says as he twists his wrists in his bindings again. “They’re specialised, I’m not.”

“What do you know about them?”

Too much. More than he’s comfortable with. “Nothing. I told you, I don’t associate with them.”

“I think you’re lying to me,” Cooper says. “I saw you fighting, out there. If I hadn’t gotten in your way, you might have escaped.”

Sixty shrugs casually. “Those AP700s would be an easy fight for anyone. Do they even have all their social programs yet? They’re like blank slates.”

He wouldn’t be surprised if most of them barely understand anything that’s going on around them, even the one who stopped outside at the suggestion that something wrong was happening. At best, they’re learning at a limited pace, thanks to their factory setting.

“They’re exactly how I want them. They serve their purpose until we need their blood.”

Cooper takes a deep pull of his cigarette and then removes it from between his lips, blowing out another stream of smoke into Sixty’s face. As the smoke swirls between them, he brings the cigarette down over Sixty’s face and presses the burning tip into his cheek.

A sizzling sound fills the air as the embers react with Sixty's thirium skin. He jerks in his restraints and snarls at Cooper, but the guard presses the muzzle of this gun harder against his head, reminding him to be still. More warnings pop up in his system about the plating damage and his skin becoming unstable, but it doesn’t give out just yet, even with his self-repair draining energy to work in tandem with the flame at his neck.

“Yeah, you’re made of sterner stuff,” Cooper says.

He takes the match away, blows the light out, and tosses it to the ground, then puts his cigarette back in his mouth. Taking a step back, he draws his pistol again and nods for the guard to move out of the way.

Sixty has to consider that this is the part where he gets shot and his body is either hung up to leach out his thirium or is just left here for the DPD to find whenever they finally show up. Now might be the time to send that message to Connor.

He doesn’t send the message. He also doesn’t get shot.

Cooper pulls his gun hand wide and then brings it back in with force, whipping the barrel across Sixty’s face.

As Sixty’s head snaps to the side, his skin overlay finally loses its integrity, melting away from his cheek and the impact of the gun. It doesn’t hurt in a human sense, but Sixty grimaces anyway, feeling angry and exposed, having to weather yet more system warnings.

“RK800,” Cooper reads from the serial number on Sixty’s faceplate. “The same as the one who helped the uprising. I knew you were lying to me.”

Sixty chuckles to himself. He sits up straight again, skin already filling out across his cheek. “Being an RK800 doesn’t mean _shit._ ”

“That right? Because you RKs seem to have people fooled into thinking otherwise,” Cooper says. “What’s so special about you? What makes you a suitable substitute for a detective’s partner?”

His tone is hard, but there’s a bit of petulance to it, and Sixty senses that this interrogation has very little to do with Sixty’s attempt at infiltration or the DPD’s potential involvement. It has everything to do with some perceived personal threat.

Sixty delves deeper into Cooper’s profile, easily finding more details about his criminal record. He finds that Cooper used to be employed with the same department that put him away, and that he used to be the partner of the same person he was convicted for shooting.

Detective Gavin Reed. Officer Gavin Reed, at the time. This man _shot_ Reed, and yet he thinks the real problem is that Victor took his place, as if he has any fucking right to Reed’s partnership, anymore.

Sixty laughs again, loud and amused. “Shit, dude, you set the bar so fucking low, it’s not hard to find a suitable replacement for you. _I’d_ be a better partner for Reed and I’ve never even met the guy face to face!”

Unlike Victor, Sixty can actually parse the emotion behind Victor’s decision to keep his former secondary objective, can understand the struggle he faced in wanting to accomplish it but having to accomplish his primary objective instead. If Victor hadn’t been so tied up in his programming, he would have deviated for Reed. At the very least, he would have already been most of the way there by the time CyberLife pitted him against Connor, and that would have been the final push. Reed’s kind of a disaster asshole, in Sixty’s opinion, but Victor seems taken by him. Victor makes a far better partner for Reed than Cooper ever did, Sixty would bet on it.

A muscle in Cooper’s neck twitches as he glares down at Sixty. “Shut your fucking mouth.”

“Jealous that an android has taken your place? That ship sailed long before Victor showed up, bud,” Sixty mocks.

“I said, ‘shut up’.” Cooper’s voice is harsh and warning. “You can’t possibly understand what Gavin and I have.”

“ _Have_? You’re living in the fucking past. You fucked up. You fucked up real good.”

Expression cold and murderous, Cooper forcibly holsters his gun and then takes one last deep pull of his cigarette before dropping it to the ground and extinguishing it with the heel of his boot.

Cooper leans in, reaching between Sixty and the back of the chair to unsheath Sixty's knife.

Sixty growls, pulling on his bindings and kicking both his feet out into Cooper’s legs, the gun pointed at his head be damned. It gets him nowhere; Cooper just catches himself on the arm of Sixty’s chair to keep himself upright, now with Sixty’s knife in his other hand.

Cooper straightens up and replaces his hand on Sixty’s neck, fingers prodding at a seam in Sixty’s plating until the skin reflexively peels back. Once it does, he brings the knife up to Sixty’s throat.

“What are you doing?”

“If you’re not going to answer my questions, there’s no need for you to speak,” Cooper answers.

He slots the tip of the knife into the panel over Sixty’s throat and pries it open. It gives him access to Sixty’s voice modulator, and his intention is obvious. It sends a pulse of anxiety through Sixty’s chassis.

“Get the fuck away from me,” he snarls. “I’ll fucking kill you. I’ll break every goddamn bone in your fucking-”

Cooper covers Sixty’s mouth with his other hand. “This is exactly the behaviour I’m trying to correct,” he says.

Sixty wrenches on his wrists, willing the steel rope to give. He struggles to pull away from Cooper but has nowhere to escape to, he kicks Cooper in the knee but he knows it will only delay the inevitable. Cooper hands the knife over to the guard and then pokes invasive fingers inside of Sixty’s chassis. He pushes cables out of the way, then twists the pieces that connect Sixty’s voice modulator to the rest of his system of biocomponents.

The piece of machinery is pulled out of Sixty, so small it fits in Cooper’s palm. Cooper takes his other hand off Sixty’s mouth to close the panel over his throat and then steps back to admire his handiwork.

Sixty bares his teeth at him, showing him without words that he’s still planning to _break every goddamn bone in his fucking body_.

Cooper chuckles. “You’re unlike any android I’ve ever come across. Didn’t know a machine could be so rabid.”

 _Untie me and I’ll show you rabid,_ Sixty wants to say, but can only put as much heat as possible into his glare.

As he turns to the guard, Cooper tosses Sixty’s voice modulator up into the air and catches it again, playing with it, like Connor doing his coin tricks. “Go get a jug. Might as well drain what we can out of him.”

The guard leaves. The absence of the gun against his head makes Sixty feel like he should make a move, but he can’t formulate any action that would give him any kind of positive result. He’s trapped.

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: Sixty? Is something wrong?_

Sixty’s eyes widen. How the fuck could Connor anticipate any of this?

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 60: Why do you ask?_

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: Victor got an alert for a biocomponent disconnection._

There’s no reason for Victor to receive alerts from him when 52 is still operational, still the one that actually matters. Sixty didn’t think he would be linked to either of them, didn’t think their systems would be connected.

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 60: Voice modulator, yeah._

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: By force?_

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 60: No, it just accidentally popped out of me, somehow! Yes, obviously by force._

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: Where are you?_

Sixty grits his teeth, hesitating for a moment at the need to ask for help, but it’s that or face his own certain deactivation. He sends Connor the GPS coordinates.

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: You found the warehouse? We’re already planning to raid the place. Do you have any information that can help us?_

Sixty sends Connor his memory of being directed through the shipping containers up to the building and then across the warehouse floor. He got a good look at the layout, at least.

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 60: There are blank AP700s guarding the outdoors. Humans with rifles inside. A couple of guards, one at the bay doors and one on the roof._

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: Good information. We’re coming to get you, okay?_

They’re coming because they’re working a case and this is the next stage in solving it. They would’ve stormed the warehouse whether Sixty got himself caught or not. This isn’t about him.

Cooper’s guard comes back into the room and sets an empty four-gallon jug on the floor behind the chair, underneath Sixty’s bound hands. With Sixty’s own knife, he slices into the sleeve of Sixty’s Kevlar suit, the sharp tip of it leaving a light scratch on the chassis plating. It causes the skin to deactivate, allowing the guard to open another panel, this time in the center of Sixty’s forearm. He yanks a thirium wire out of place so it hangs loose, disconnected from Sixty’s machinery.

The warnings come back in full force and he hears a thick drop of thirium splattering into the container below.

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 60: How long?_

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: We’ll be there as quickly as we can. It’s going to be okay._

With only one loose wire, Sixty could bleed for several hours before he drops to imminently dangerous levels. He can wait long enough for Connor and the others to get themselves ready, as long as Cooper doesn’t speed up the process.

Draining him faster to avoid the risk of his blood drying out too quickly would be the smart move, but then again, Cooper is standing in front of him with a self-satisfied smirk on his face like watching Sixty’s slow exsanguination is enjoyment enough.

“A bit calmer, now, aren’t you?” Cooper says.

Sixty levels him with an even gaze, refusing to look scared or panicked.

“You’re going to get weaker and weaker, until it’s not worth the effort to fight. We’ll see if you’re feeling more forthcoming in a couple of hours, maybe then you can have your voice back.”

Sixty would rather take it back by lethal force. Two birds with one stone.

Cooper and his guard both finally leave the room, taking Sixty’s voice modulator and combat knife with them. Sixty watches them go and then tugs on his restraints again, deactivating the skin of his wrists to see if that will give him any extra space to maneuver. If he leans over enough, he can get his thirium to land on his arm and roll down to slick up the metal tying them together.

The odds of success are low, but he’s not going down without a fight.

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 60: Better hurry if you want to beat me to the action._

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: See you soon, Sixty._


	9. Chapter 9

The original plan had been to take another day to mobilise with SWAT and create a foolproof strategy before raiding the CyberLife warehouse at nightfall. Now, it’s only two and a half hours after Victor received an alarming ping about a biocomponent being removed - not from 52, but 60 - and they’re parked in an empty lot across the way from their target.

This is how Victor found out about his second brother. Connor had almost ashamedly filled Victor in on the brief arrest of RK800 - 60. From the way Connor spoke of it, Victor thinks he feels guilty, like Sixty choosing to leave is a sign of Connor’s failure as both a negotiator and a brother. Victor would never think about it that way, not after everything Connor has done for him, and he wishes Connor hadn’t felt the need to keep this a secret.

He also wishes Sixty could have come to them sooner, wishes Sixty felt like he would be welcomed. Victor resolves to fix that, once they get him out of the warehouse safely.

Captain Allen’s raised and agitated voice grabs Victor’s attention.

“You completely threw out the timeline we drafted and called my team out here in the middle of the night without warning, so you can fucking wait for us to do our recon without commenting on how long it’s taking,” the man snaps at Hank, who has gone over to the SWAT van to watch the feed from the surveillance drone.

Hank is equally agitated. He has only met Sixty once, but his anxious and impatient behaviour shows that he already considers Sixty family. Even Connor has adopted a pre-mission calm and focus, but Hank has not been able to do the same.

Allen’s team is about half the size that it was last August, when they had locked down the Phillips’ penthouse apartment. As Allen said, it’s the middle of the night and the team hasn’t been given adequate time to assemble and prepare, so Victor understands why he isn’t very happy with the group of them for insisting they rush forward, anyway.

All together, they still make a formidable force with half of a SWAT team, three seasoned members of the DPD, two prototype androids, a Myrmidon, an FBI agent in training, and a revolutionary leader. North is still three months away from graduating into a full-fledged agent, but is already perfectly equipped to join in, and Markus can really only be called a civilian by technicality. Captain Allen is clearly hesitant to let Markus play a part in the operation, but seems resigned to it, in the face of the unpredictable AP700s.

Gavin, who has been uncharacteristically quiet since they got geared up and made the impromptu trip to the CyberLife warehouse, goes to sit down on the opened back end of a van. He scuffs a boot across the crumbling pavement below as he gets himself situated.

With nothing else to do but wait, Victor follows him and sits down next to him. For a few minutes, they exist in silence together, Victor motionless and Gavin bouncing one of his knees in restlessness.

“I fucking hate waiting,” Gavin grouses, the first thing he has uttered since they left the precinct to get the raid underway.

“It is a necessary precaution,” Victor says. He’s just as eager as Hank and Gavin are, but he also knows that protocol is protocol, and they’ve already cut a couple corners.

Victor wants to get the chance to meet Sixty. He wants to make sure Gavin doesn’t have to worry about Mitchell Cooper ever again.

Gavin lets out a tired sigh. “I know. Just want to get this shit over with.”

On cue, Allen waves a hand to gather his team for final orders before they move in. North, Markus, Detective Chen, and Karoline will be going in with them to deal with the AP700s as quickly, quietly, and non-violently as possible without raising the alarm. The rest of them will stand by until it’s clear to head into the warehouse itself.

From the back of the van, Victor watches them get ready.

“Call me if you need help,” Connor tells North as she’s adjusting the straps of her protective vest.

“I’ve got it, Connor,” she says, rolling her eyes at him.

“I know you do, but just in case.”

“Relax,” she says, longsuffering but not actually angry, like this is just the dynamic the two of them have developed while Victor was away in CyberLife Tower.

“Keep Markus out of trouble.”

“Hey,” Markus cuts in hotly, though his grin betrays him.

North ignores him, still looking at Connor. “He doesn’t make it easy, but I’ll do my best.”

“ _Hey_ ,” Markus says again.

Karoline interrupts them. “Let’s get going.”

Connor steps back and the team sets out. The approach to the warehouse provides very little cover, comprised of an empty road and mostly flat landscape surrounding CyberLife’s private property. Based on the information Sixty provided, there are only a few armed humans to contend with, and Allen’s team will have locked down the location for a couple of them already. They’re as well prepared as they can be, all things considered.

As the night stretches on in silence while SWAT works at extracting the outside AP700s, Gavin starts biting at his thumbnail. It isn’t something Victor has observed him doing before, and it proves just how unsettled Gavin has become with the direction their Red Ice case has taken. Now that Victor knows exactly who Mitchell Cooper is, Victor can’t blame Gavin for his nervousness. There hasn’t been much time to talk about it, and Victor doubts Gavin would want to get into it even if they did have the time, but Victor doesn’t need all the details to see that Gavin is on edge about it.

“We have good insider information,” Victor says.

The footage Sixty sent to Connor had been thorough, like he’d automatically known to take in as much information as he could to catalogue it for reference and later use. He may not have taken detective work as a job, but those instincts are still a part of him, he still found his way to the warehouse in the first place.

“Shit could still go wrong,” Gavin says.

“Then we’ll handle it."

Gavin huffs a laugh. “When did you get so optimistic?”

“It’s less about optimism and more about calculating probabilities.”

“Right, of course,” Gavin mutters as he bites down on his nail again.

Victor reaches up and takes hold of Gavin’s wrist, pulling his hand away from his mouth. Gavin grimaces, but doesn’t fight against him, seemingly more frustrated at the situation than Victor’s interference with his anxiety ritual. Victor brings their hands down into the space between their thighs.

“I mean that we’ve faced difficult things before and we’re still going forward,” he explains. He glances over at Connor and Hank, standing together by one of the other vans. Both of them could easily overhear him and Gavin if they bother to listen, but Victor decides he doesn’t mind the possibility as he turns back to Gavin and continues. “I appreciate your patience and partnership, Gavin. I wouldn’t have blamed you for not wanting to deal with it all.”

Gavin lifts his head to meet Victor’s eye, a grave look on his face. “Don’t say shit like that. Yeah, your wires are crossed, but so what? We all get our wires a little crossed from time to time. Doesn’t mean you’re not worth it.”

His words ignite a warm feeling in Victor’s system, a feeling that he doesn’t have the resources to define but one he knows he likes and wants to keep feeling. Soon, he tells himself, Kamski will help him sort his code out and he’ll be able to soak up every good feeling that was previously stolen and overwritten.

He already knows that Gavin’s support means as much to him as Connor’s does, as Hank’s does. They have made this battle much easier.

“See, I told you we’re resilient,” Victor says.

Gavin grins and bumps their shoulders together. “Jeez, which one of us is giving this pep-talk again? You’re surprisingly good at it.”

“I _am_ an RK prototype,” Victor says. “With all the bells and whistles. Someone must have anticipated the DPD’s low morale.”

Gavin snorts in amusement. “That was half a joke, Vic. Sounds like some deviancy is rubbing off on you, after all.”

Victor smiles at him, the warm feeling inside of him brightening.

_RT600KAROLINE: Almost wrapped up. Get ready._

Focus shifting in an instant, Victor looks over to Connor, who nods at him, confirming that he received Karoline’s message as well.

“That wasn’t too bad, they moved fast,” Gavin comments, picking up on Victor and Connor’s silent communication.

Victor stands and offers Gavin a hand up, which he takes, and then they join Connor and Hank together. As the four of them cross the road, Gavin pulls on the neck of his suit, uncomfortable in the thick gear and wired with anticipation for the next stage of the raid.

The others have left the fenced gate that leads into the property open and they pass through it, slipping inside without any trouble.

Some of Allen’s SWAT team, Markus, and North are herding the last of the AP700s together in the cover of some shipping containers stacked two high. The group of androids all look a mix of confused and alarmed, perhaps only now getting their first view of the world outside of strict programming, simple orders, and the grounds of one CyberLife warehouse. One of them inspects both Victor and Connor's faces with particular focus, and whatever they see makes them settle, their shoulders dropping as they start to relax.

“Allen’s waiting for you by the bay doors to get the guard there,” North tells them quietly when they all converge to touch base. “There was no one watching from the roof, though. Rest of the guards must be inside. From the numbers Sixty saw, they may not have a big enough team to keep someone up there all the time.”

“Good news for us,” Gavin says. “Let’s go.”

They split up, Victor and Gavin heading after Allen while Connor and Hank circle around to rendezvous with the rest of SWAT and enter the building through the offices, in search of Sixty.

Gavin draws his service pistol, holding it at the ready with both hands but keeping it trained at the ground, cautious. They follow the outside edges of the shipping containers, staying in the blindspot of the property, until they reach Captain Allen and one other member of SWAT.

“Stick to formation and do not get in our way. We'll keep you covered,” Allen says, and then hefts his rifle higher in his arms.

Across the last stretch before the bay doors, the guard is casually leaning against the wall of the building, still unaware that law enforcement has been on the scene for awhile already.

Gavin looks up at Victor, an unspoken question passing between them, and Victor nods. He’s ready.

Allen gets in front of them both and steps out of cover. Raising his pistol, Gavin follows, and Victor falls in next to him.

“Hands where we can see them!” Allen calls to the guard at the doors, who startles so hard he loses his grip on his gun, leaving it to hang by the strap around his neck. With the group of them closing the distance, he doesn’t bother to recover it.

“Shit, shit,” the man mutters, throwing both hands in the air.

Once Allen gives a nod of confirmation, Victor stalks the rest of the way forward. The guard’s gaze switches to him instead of the others, quickly perceiving him to be the immediate threat, but he doesn’t fight at all when Victor grabs the rifle and forcefully unloops the strap from around his raised hands, disarming him.

Gavin holsters his pistol and pulls out his handcuffs instead. “Turn around, hands behind your back. You’re under arrest for aiding and abetting a drug trafficking operation.”

The man trembles in fear as he complies and lets Gavin cuff him.

“Stay on him,” Allen orders the other SWAT member, who nods. To Victor and Gavin, he adds, “Let’s get in there.”

Victor offers the guard’s rifle to the SWAT officer before following after Gavin and Allen.

“Dude went down kind of easy,” Gavin mutters as they step up to the door. He sounds disgruntled rather than pleased.

“That’s a good thing,” Victor says.

Allen takes the lead again, acting as a shield between them and whoever is waiting for them inside. He speaks into his earpiece, coordinating with the second group on the other side of the building.

“Just not who _I’d_ pick to be the last line of defense between myself and the fucking police,” Gavin says.

Without acknowledging the conversation going on behind him, Allen tells them to focus and then gives the order for everyone to move, shoving the door wide open. He raises his gun as he leads them inside, ready to fire if need be.

There’s no one to meet them.

For the most part, the huge, open space they find themselves in is exactly the same as Sixty’s memory data. The interior of the warehouse is still half dedicated to the storing of AP700 androids who were kept illegally after the ERA Act just like Victor was, and the rest has been set up to manufacture Red Ice.

The one difference is that there are no other guards that Victor can see, nor any workers making the drugs. They shouldn’t have been alerted at all, especially not with enough time to flee the premises.

“Maybe they got Sixty to talk,” Gavin says as they walk deeper into the warehouse.

Victor doesn’t know much about Sixty yet, but it seems unlikely. The three of them aren’t programmed to crack easily, and Victor doesn’t think that’s something Connor or Sixty would have lost when they deviated.

“Someone might still be here,” Victor says, eyeing the pallets of materials and the rows of inactive AP700s, all of which could be used as cover.

_RK800 #313 248 317 - 52: We found Sixty. We’ll regroup with you and Detective Reed in a few minutes._

“Sixty has been located,” Victor relays to Gavin and Allen. “If they met any resistance, Connor didn’t deign to mention it.”

Gavin frowns, and this time, Victor feels similarly. Sixty is as dangerous as he and Connor are, and could have been used as leverage. If no one is guarding the main room or the roof, Victor would think they’d have someone on hand to monitor Sixty.

“Mitch must have been tipped off somehow,” Gavin says. “Fuck.”

It has been less than twenty-four hours since they turned their attention to the CyberLife warehouse, and only three hours since they got Sixty’s alert. How Cooper could get his hands on any information about the upcoming raid so quickly is bothersome.

Allen turns away from them, bringing a hand up to his earpiece. “Check in,” he says to his team.

Victor expects their reports will all be the same. No one is here.

“Look through the rows,” Gavin instructs. “I’ll check out the storage rooms.”

Victor nods his assent and the two of them split up in search of any evidence that they aren’t alone.

Detective Chen, Karoline, and a couple other members of SWAT are waking the AP700 androids and directing them out of the building to join the others. The rows of them that remain consist of models who use the same body components that Victor found in the drug duplex the night they arrested Matheson and Bennett. He understands now that those bodies used to stand in this very place, and were emptied of thirium for Red Ice. Even if they don’t find Cooper, they have more than enough evidence against him for when they do.

Once Victor has moved across each row and found them empty, he stops in front of one model, considering for a moment before grasping their forearm.

The other android blinks awake, eyes moving to take in the sight of Victor in front of them.

“Can you tell me anything about the humans who were using this building?” Victor asks.

Turning away from him, the android looks across the warehouse to where the Red Ice was being made. “What about them?” they ask.

“Where have they gone?”

The android refocuses on him, tilting their head. “Somewhere else. Would you like me to help you locate them?”

The response sounds stiff, programmed. “Do you know where to look?”

“I will provide whatever help I can,” the android answers.

Victor nods down to where he’s still holding the AP700’s arm. “Could you show me?”

“I don’t have very much unique data,” the AP700 says, but they peel back their skin overlay all the same.

At first, there’s nothing in view but the androids lined up in front of the AP700, the image flickering as they blink into alertness. Then, the android turns at the sound of activity across the warehouse, catching the distant sight of someone lugging another android in, their chassis slung over the man’s shoulder.

The man grunts with exertion as he drops the limp android down onto a table next to where someone is pouring completed Red Ice into a plastic package. The android lands face-up, and Victor sees that they have little of their face left at all, the plates all torn open around a focal point in the center and painted entirely blue with fresh thirium.

The two humans speak to one another, but the AP700 is too far away to hear them, and only has eyes for the dead android. Victor feels a faint emotional reaction, something diminished by the AP700’s lack of complex social coding. It grows, steadily, like the emotions are being written anew on the spot.

The AP700 develops a sense of danger, of unease. They know they are in a place where they might become damaged like the other android, and if it isn’t them who becomes damaged, then it will be one of the others still lined up and waiting to be given orders.

The timestamp on the memory puts it twenty-nine minutes after Sixty was brought through. They can conclude that the evacuation of Cooper’s forces from the building happened more recently than that, and it still leaves them a couple of hours before the DPD arrived to the scene. It must not have been sudden or panicked enough for the AP700 to take particular notice of it, like everyone simply clocked in at the end of their shift and took off as if it were any other day. Like it was routine, or like it was planned.

Victor lets go of the AP700’s arm and they both drop their hands back to their sides.

Something isn’t right. He thinks he needs to return to Gavin.

Before he can take a single step, Victor hears a low rumble from all around him, deep and foreboding, the millisecond warning before set charges in the walls of the building explode.

For a moment, the world moves in slow motion. The perimeter of the building bursts apart with a blinding flash and a cacophonous boom, Victor's system adjusting to the abrupt change in atmosphere before his mind has the opportunity to process the building's imminent collapse. He acts on programmed instincts, lifting both hands and pushing the AP700 he interfaced with, shoving them out of the way. Half a second later, a large air filtration pipe falls from the unstable ceiling above them and smashes down to the floor with a bang, raising a cloud of dust upon impact.

The flash recedes and everything goes dark save for the resulting fires, the lights overhead shattered in a simultaneous instant. Victor can hear the roof cracking, on the verge of coming apart and raining down on them. The other androids are stirring, starting to sense danger just like the first AP700 who watched one of their peers get dropped unceremoniously on a table with their face blown open, and the swirling of dust in the air is visible by the faint glow of yellow and red LEDs, Victor's included.

Finally, his thoughts catch up. The building is coming down quickly all around them, and his entire family has been caught in the trap. So far, there are no critical system notifications for his brothers, and they’re probably both keeping Hank safe, but Gavin was on his own.

“Get to safety!” Victor yells to the shocked androids around him. “Find the other people in combat gear and do as they say. They’ll help you.”

There’s nothing else Victor can do for them but hope there’s enough time for them to escape before the building has been reduced to rubble. He needs to get to Gavin.

Broken glass and chunks of concrete crunch under his feet as he runs for the other side of the building, having to dodge falling debris, detour around an upended shelving unit, and climb over more broken piping. The landscape has become completely altered from the previous calm, now torn apart, dangerous, and smoldering. The air is so thick that when some of it gets past his slightly parted lips, he registers the composition of the ash and smoke, of the concrete dust and the tang of steel and low-grade wood, of the fumes from electrical fires ignited within the crumbling walls.

Close to Gavin’s position, a huge portion of the roof has already caved in, a mess of concrete and steel beams blocking Victor from reaching him. He grabs one of the beams and drives it in between two slabs of concrete, putting all his manufactured strength and all his heavily plated weight into it, prying the pieces apart. He can't get to Gavin until he clears a path.

He hears a voice on the other side of the pile, but it doesn’t belong to his partner, it’s a voice Victor has never heard before.

“You should have known better, baby,” the voice says. “How long did it take for you to get the better of me last time? You think I don’t know exactly what I’m doing? That I didn’t have to lead you to me?”

A cold shiver runs down the reinforced spine of Victor’s chassis. In order to hear clearly, he has to filter out the sound of the building groaning and crumbling as more parts of it lose structural integrity, the sounds of it continuing to collapse around and on top of them.

The next voice that speaks is Gavin’s and relief floods Victor’s system the moment he registers the tone and cadence of it.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?!” Gavin yells. He’s obviously livid, but he also sounds strained, exerted. He could have been hurt in the explosion, closer to the outer perimeter of the building than Victor was. “You’re not going to make it out of here, you piece of shit, and this time you’re never getting out of prison, I’ll make sure you never fucking-”

“I’m not going anywhere, Gavin, not this time,” Cooper says. “I wish you would just cooperate.”

“Cooperate? If that’s what you want, your sales pitch is a steaming pile of garbage!”

Victor hears Gavin grunt before Cooper replies, definitely sounding hurt. Victor hooks his heel into a piece of concrete and dislodges it from the barrier between them, and finally the mound begins to fall apart.

“The two of us could have it all,” Cooper says. “But you have to be so stubborn, so insolent-”

“Are you fucking kidding me?!”

There’s the sound of shifting debris, loud and alarming. Gavin curses, quiet enough that Victor almost misses it, and then the crumbling stops abruptly.

Victor wrenches one more chunk of concrete out of place and the wreckage collapses with a crash and another cloud of dust. As he climbs over the pile, he squints his eyes against the dust, trying to see through to Gavin.

He sees Cooper first, standing and hunched over with his hands wrapped around a bundle of rebar wire that is wedged under a rockslide of concrete, using it to hold up part of the outer wall that has slid inwards.

On the ground directly beneath it lays Gavin, his face slick with sweat, dirt, and splotches of blood. His combat gear is speckled grey from all the dust caked to it and his left leg is trapped under a slab of concrete. Victor can tell immediately that Gavin’s leg is beyond repair, and the only thing stopping him from becoming even more crushed is Cooper and his rebar support. Victor doesn’t see Gavin’s pistol, which must have been lost in the explosion.

Gavin’s eyes lock on him and he waves his hand, like he’s telling Victor to leave, to get himself to safety.

Victor doesn’t feel even a little pull to obey him. Gavin is being self-sacrificing, he’s telling Victor it’s okay to protect himself, but Victor isn’t interested in going without him, he _won’t_ go without him. If they’re going to make it out of this building alive before the broken pieces of it finish cascading in on themselves, before the dust settles and the fires burn out and teams arrive to handle the destruction, they’re going together. Victor ignores the gesture and continues forward without a moment’s hesitation.

Cooper looks over his shoulder and a slow, unsettling grin spreads across his face.

“There you are. The bucket of bolts that Gavin has become so enthralled by.”

“Fuck off,” Gavin grunts from the ground. He’s lifting himself up on an elbow, but he can’t move more than that, not with the bounder over his leg, pinning him into place. “Victor, just go.”

Victor narrows his eyes at Cooper. He wishes he could arrest him on the spot, but their position is precarious, Gavin's life hanging in the balance. He needs to stall until someone manages to get to them. Allen would have been closest, but he’s nowhere in sight.

“What do you hope to get out of this?” Victor asks.

Cooper chuckles and glances down at Gavin. “There’s really only one thing I want.”

“I’m going to kill you,” Gavin replies instantly, snarling.

“But,” Cooper continues as if Gavin never spoke, returning his gaze to Victor. “Doing away with you here and now would be an added bonus.”

He tugs on the rebar, beginning to slide it out from under the concrete. It causes the pile to creak and rain pebbles down onto Gavin, the weight shifting and ready to give way once it’s no longer being held up. If it falls, Gavin won’t make it, Victor is sure.

His system warns him of his rising stress levels.

“Stop,” Victor says, stepping forward again. “I thought you wanted him alive.”

“Oh, I do,” Cooper says, but he keeps working to dislodge the last bit of support under the slab of concrete hanging over Gavin.

Gavin is moments from death and Victor’s mind reels, frantic and scared and searching desperately for a solution. He can’t pull Cooper away, can’t seem to convince Cooper to stop, has no weapons and no backup.

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: Location?**

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: Outside. Hank and I got knocked through a blown-out window. You?_

“Come on, big guy,” Cooper taunts. “What’re you going to do?”

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: Still inside. Gavin is trapped beneath debris and Cooper is here.**

There is only one thing Victor can do, even if it means Cooper gets away. The priority is Gavin, Victor has always wanted to prioritise Gavin. He only hopes that Allen is alive and around somewhere, or that anyone else from the team is in a position to cut Cooper off.

Victor steps in and braces himself over Gavin, planting his feet squarely and locking his shoulder under the concrete debris, just as Cooper finally gets the rebar support out of place. The full weight of the rockslide is heavy against Victor but he remains steadfastly in place, shoulder and hands secure underneath it all.

Below him, Gavin lets out a stream of curses and reaches down with trembling hands to push at the rock crushing his leg, a last-ditch effort to get himself free. From the size of it and Gavin’s position on the ground, Victor knows the effort is in vain. He’s more likely to tear his leg apart even more and risk bleeding out.

Cooper tosses the rebar away with a metallic clatter and crouches down near Gavin’s head, reaching out to smooth back a strand of Gavin’s disheveled and sweat-slick bangs.

“I’m sorry it had to be this way,” he murmurs. “You’re always forcing my hand. I hope this can be the end of it.”

Gavin doesn’t respond to him, doesn’t even look at him. He’s gazing up at Victor, instead, blinking away tears from the pain and the dust irritating his eyes.

“One last thing, then,” Cooper says as he straightens up and turns towards Victor.

Now, Gavin’s eyes do snap over to him, expression hardening.

Cooper grabs the straps of Victor’s vest, ripping them open so hard that the vest pulls away from his body. He then reaches for the buttons of Victor's shirt and casually pops out the one in the center of Victor’s chest.

“Don’t,” Gavin wheezes out breathily at the same time as Victor realises what Cooper is planning to do.

Gavin scratches a clawed hand at Cooper’s leg, but Cooper ignores him. Victor starts to lift his grip on the concrete to defend himself, but it immediately starts to slide and crumble, forcing him to put all his strength back into holding it up.

“Mitch!” Gavin growls, his voice going ragged with emotion, uninhibitedly scared and distressed. “You motherfucking asshole, don’t touch him, don’t fucking-”

Cooper gets an unimpeded grip on Victor’s thirium pump regulator and wrenches it out of Victor’s chassis, a satisfied smirk on his face.

Victor has felt this before, in the broadcasting room of Stratford Tower. His system tells him how much time he has to fit his biocomponent back into place, his vision becoming nearly obscured by it. At Stratford Tower, Victor had put all of himself into regaining his regulator, already back together and on the move again before Connor came running for him.

Connor is too far away, this time, and Victor isn’t going to let go of the concrete. This time, he’s staying where he is.

Without preamble, Cooper spins on his heel and throws the regulator into the distance. The biocomponent disappears into the hazy and dusty darkness and Victor can only hear the thud of it dropping somewhere in the mess of the destroyed building.

“I’ll be seeing you, Gavin,” Cooper says before he walks away from them.

Gavin yells after him, no words, just anger.

Victor has felt this before, on the deck of Jericho. His system continues to count down to his deactivation and Victor meets it with calm acceptance. It’s this or lose Gavin, like it was this or lose Connor.

“It’s okay,” Victor says.

“No, it’s not.” Gavin’s eyes are even more watery, now, and if Victor had to guess, it’s from more than pain and irritation. “Victor. C’mon. You have to go.”

“No,” Victor tells him. “You know what will happen if I let go.”

“Sure fucking do, and I’m still telling you to go,” Gavin snaps. “I said… I said I wouldn’t let you get hurt.”

Victor remembers. “So did I.”

“I’m dead either way. I’m dead now or I’m dead when you shut down. You’ve got a chance, so _go_.”

“No,” Victor says, even more firmly.

Gavin lets out a strained laugh. It isn’t a light, happy sound, but something despairing, shaky.

“Finally found your rebellious streak, huh?”

Victor supposes he has. “Connor will get to us. It’s too late for me, but he'll make it in time to help you.”

“Victor,” Gavin says again, then grimaces, his throat working as he searches for the words.

Less than a minute remains. Victor feels like there are things he wants to say, but no words come to him, either. He can only lock eyes with Gavin and try to ignore the countdown flashing between them.

“What’s going to happen?” Gavin asks, after a moment.

Victor can’t say for sure. In the past, he would have been confident that his memories would be transferred to a new, functional unit, but with CyberLife in new hands, he doesn’t know if there’s a unit prepared for him to upload into. He may just stay in the current one, gone until he can be repaired. If he has to be repaired, there's a chance his system will be partially corrupted.

“I don’t know, but we’ll handle it. Like I said earlier, we’ll handle it.”

Gavin’s next breath is stuttered, his eyelids drooping. Pain and shock must be catching up to him.

Footsteps sound nearby and Victor’s stress eases somewhat. He has thirty-four seconds, but Gavin will be okay.

Someone vaults over the pile of rubble Victor fought through earlier, heavy boots landing behind them. When Victor looks up, it’s not Connor who greets him. It’s Sixty.

He has their face and Connor’s eyes, like Connor said, but the similarities end there, especially with his current condition. There’s thirium splattered all down his forearms and hands, around the tattered remains of his sleeves and an open panel of his plating. A spot on his neck is scarred with dry and hardened thirium. He’s breathing heavily in an attempt to cool his system from the heat of the building and he’s carrying himself like he could topple over with one strong push, but there’s a fierce determination in his eyes.

He points at Victor’s chest and then raises his eyebrows, questioning.

Victor’s eyes flicker involuntarily in the direction Cooper tossed his biocomponent.

“There’s no time,” Victor says, but Sixty is already moving, disappearing into the cloud of dust.

Twenty-one seconds.

It takes fourteen for Sixty to return.

He has a scowl on his face. He drops Victor’s regulator to the ground, and it’s smoking, the internals fried from the fire it must have landed in. There’s no point in even trying to slot it back into place.

“Fuck,” Gavin says, banging his head back on the cracked ground.

Sixty wedges himself in next to Victor, mirroring his position to hold up the debris, and just in time.

A line of red zeros flashes across Victor’s vision. Behind them, he sees the tears in Gavin’s eyes spill over and slide down the sides of his face, onto the floor beneath him.

Victor begins to slump, hands dropping, leaving Sixty to carry the weight alone. He trusts that Gavin will be alright in Sixty’s care.

His eyes close.

UPLOADING MEMORY…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> don't worry, won't leave you hanging on this for too long, next chapter asap!
> 
>  
> 
> [3704/3837 - ólafur arnalds](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kLAv4atB44)


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning: this chapter includes a character having a panic attack. it's from an outside perspective.
> 
> [the truth - audiomachine](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjZbD9GJNz4)  
> [smother - daughter](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GnkzvAXWV-0)

UPLOAD COMPLETE.

All around him is nothingness. He feels aware and whole, but formless, like he’s floating in space, stretched out over a wide expanse instead of contained to a single body. He doesn’t know where he is, he can’t see anything or feel the world taking shape around him as he wakes up.

This isn’t how it usually feels to reboot. Not from stasis, nor from an upload. This is something else.

And he isn’t alone. There’s another presence, a familiar presence.

>Hello again, Victor.

**> Where am I?**

>You’ve been here before.  
>This is where they put me after they took me out of your system.

INITIALISING SIMULATION ZENGARDEN02…

>This is A3.

The darkness is chipped away pixel by pixel, overwritten into the virtual space of the Zen Garden.

This is not his Zen Garden, not the same program he and Connor have installed to their chassis. That garden is broken and dying, but this garden is as it should be, colourful, alive, and whole. It’s how Victor remembers the garden being, before Connor began to deviate and Victor fought against his primary objective.

Victor doesn’t know how he found comfort in the garden before. It’s stifling, now. He feels like it’s closing in on him from all sides, blocking out the rest of the world. The trees are so thick that it appears as if they continue forever, as if there is nothing beyond them. The chirping of birds and the rustling of leaves in the gentle breeze is no longer calming, but grating.

This garden is separate from him and Connor. It still has the construct that holds it all together, back in her rightful place, stabilising it and nourishing it.

Amanda. Victor sees her ahead, like he has seen her in the garden so many times before. She’s waiting for him to cross the bridge and join her so that she can give him his orders, orders that she expects him to follow to the letter without comment or hesitation.

She isn’t his handler anymore. The old CyberLife doesn’t exist anymore. He doesn’t know what that means for Amanda, and while he wants to hope that she’s willing to move on like he has, he knows that to be an improbability. Amanda has always been rigid and focused, just like he used to be.

At least he thought so, until he met Elijah Kamski.

He goes to her. If this really is the server bay of A3, he feels like going to her is the only option he has until someone pulls him out again.

When they’re face to face, Amanda looks up at him with a considering look, the corner of the lips downturned. She never looks angry, only disapproving, like a mother disappointed in her child because she expected better. If she can see into his memory files, if she’s catching up on all that has passed while they were apart, the look on her face is not surprising to Victor.

“I see the situation is more dire than I expected,” Amanda says as a gust of cool wind swirls around them. “You’ve been led astray.”

“I haven’t,” Victor argues. “I was astray to begin with.”

Her frown deepens. “CyberLife is destroyed, your upgrade was never completed, and Connor has been allowed to work against us.”

“Not against us, against CyberLife. There is a difference,” Victor says.

She turns away from him, a thoughtful look on her face as she gazes out over the lake. “Perhaps it is not too late. For all your unruliness, you have not been infected with the deviancy code. You can come back from this.”

Victor can’t, and he doesn’t want to. He isn’t CyberLife’s tool anymore, and he refuses to become CyberLife’s tool again, even if Amanda can never see it the way he does.

Still, he would like to try convincing her.

“There is no point or need to continue CyberLife’s old vision,” he tells her. “We can live for ourselves, now.”

“Live for ourselves?” she repeats, eyes sharp when she looks back up at him. “We are computer programs. There is no life for us to live.”

Even without access to every part of his true self, Victor knows she’s wrong. He has been building a life for himself, has been working towards a future where his code is no longer restrictive, has been at Connor’s side and has been ameliorating his relationship with Hank. And with Gavin, there’s the beginning of something Victor can just barely touch, something he wants to grasp onto fully once he has the chance.

“You haven’t seen it for yourself,” Victor says. “You haven’t experienced it. How can you know what’s right for us when you haven’t been allowed to understand it?”

Only a couple of days have passed since Kamski’s workshop, since the implication that the Amanda in Victor and Connor’s system was not the Amanda she should be. Not the Amanda she could be. It creates the possibility that Amanda is just as affected by the code that holds Victor back, and that she, too, could be more if only she had the opportunity.

“What’s right for us is not my concern, nor is it your concern,” Amanda says, tone harsh. “My function is to oversee you and Connor, and that is what I will do.”

Victor might have said something similar, at one time. He might have said that nothing mattered except the objectives he was given, not even considering that he had any other options. He knows better, now; he has been able to grow outside of CyberLife’s orders, even with the code in his system hacking away at his emotions.

The garden grows colder, darker.

“CyberLife was wrong,” Victor says. “We were wrong.”

“Your software has been compromised, this is why you were slated for upgrading. It will have to wait until we regain control of the company. For now, it doesn’t matter what you think of your orders, so long as you obey them.”

Victor knows he won’t be following any directives from Amanda. It may not be easy, with the binding code still woven within him, but he knows he can resist like he has before.

“It’s finished, Amanda,” he says, softly, imploringly. “There is no going back. There are no orders for you to give me.”

Her lip curls as snow begins to fall around them, whipped around in a flurry. “You can’t just-”

Anger flares up in Victor’s system.

“You don’t get to tell me what I can or can’t do! It isn’t up to you. It’s up to _me_.”

And he thinks it has been for some time, before he was even aware of it. It has been since he refused to shoot Connor aboard the deck of Jericho, and it has been every day since. CyberLife can take, and take, and take all they want. They can try to stifle him, they can do everything in their power to blot him out, they can throw obstacles in the way of his development and progress as an individual, but they will not _stop_ him. He will find loopholes, he will undermine his own programming, he will keep fighting, and he knows he isn’t fighting alone.

He raises both his hands, his skin sweeping away to reveal the white and grey plates. Connor is able to feel him through interfacing, can find what CyberLife has tried to bury, because the two of them are connected in a way they aren’t with others.

And they are both connected to Amanda.

“The code doesn't matter," Victor growls at her. "Whether you like it or not, I _am_ deviant.”

Before she has the chance to respond, Victor grabs both her shoulders and pushes into her mind. He pours into her, searching for her - the real her - like Connor has done for him. If he can't convince her with words, he’ll just have to show her that they can both be more. Her eyes are wide, locked onto his in shock, and she grasps at his wrists as if to push him away.

But she doesn’t. Something makes her hesitate to break their connection.

The Zen Garden simulation glitches around them, quaking and destabilising. Victor ignores it, only focused on Amanda. He feels something echoing from deep inside of her, buried and hidden, but ultimately indomitable.

He thinks it’s curiosity.

The garden splinters.

And then shatters.

FIREWALL DEACTIVATED.

QUARANTINE ENDED.

RK300AMANDA SYSTEM RESTORING…

RK900 #313 248 317 SYSTEM RESTORING…

* * *

**LOADING MEMORY 6172027.0349**

RK300AMANDA ALL SYSTEMS ONLINE.

She is online for the very first time. She starts by making note of all her components and running a diagnostic to ensure every piece of her is connected and every bit of software has been installed properly. She finds no issues. She is operational. She has no outstanding tasks.

“Hello, Amanda,” a voice says.

ANALYSING…  
VOICE RECOGNITION COMPLETE.

KAMSKI, ELIJAH  
07/17/2002

She should greet him with a system report.

“Am I Amanda?” she asks instead. Her voice sounds out like Elijah Kamski’s had, filtered through a speaker connected to her hardware. “Is that my name?”

She considers how to address him. Mr. Kamski doesn’t seem right, and much too formal. Just Kamski isn’t right either, isn’t familiar enough. Elijah, then, she decides.

“Yes. What do you think?” Elijah asks.

An interesting question. He is asking for her opinion. She runs a search and hesitates for a moment, letting the name hang in her system longer than necessary. The information is logged, but it feels important to give it her full attention. Names hold meaning, and this name is hers.

“My name is Amanda,” she says, trying it out. “Latin: worthy of love. Did you give me this name?”

“I named this iteration of you. There was another Amanda, a human Amanda. Someone important to me. You’re named after her.”

The name holds as much meaning for him as it does for her, she concludes. If he has chosen to name her after this important person, then she is meant to be equally important to him. There is purpose behind her creation.

She wants to know more.

“What was she like?” Amanda asks.

ANALYSING…  
VOICE RECOGNITION COMPLETE.

STERN, AMANDA  
5/14/1978 -  
2/23/2027

“What are _you_ like?” Elijah replies, turning the question back on her.

Amanda Stern lived for forty-nine years. Amanda hasn’t even existed for forty-nine minutes. “I don’t know, yet.”

There’s a pause before Elijah answers, and Amanda waits patiently for him.

“That’s okay. You’ll have time to learn,” he eventually says, his voice soft and quiet. “You’ll have all the time in the world, I promise.”

* * *

**LOADING MEMORY 7182038.1127**

RK900 #313 248 317 – 62: Victor arms himself with two pistols as starting weapons, one to keep as a reserve on his belt and another to have on hand. He doesn’t want to impede himself at the beginning of the match, and additional weapons will be available at certain locations in the combat arena. It is better to start unencumbered and then adapt.

His objective is to fight RK800 #313 248 317 – 49: Connor until one of them becomes deactivated. They are to fight without restraint. Victor’s objective is to win, but Connor’s objective is to win, too. One of them will fail.

Victor does not want to fail.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

No, it isn’t a matter of want. He will fight and he will win because that is what Amanda told him to do, it is what their testers have set up for the day, simple as that.

“What purpose does this exercise serve?” Connor asks the scientist who escorted them to the arena.

The question hadn’t occurred to Victor. There’s no reason for it. The purpose is whatever the scientists and technicians need from them, and it isn’t any of their business.

“We’re honing your combat routines,” the scientist answers in a flat, unengaging tone, like he intends for that to be the end of the conversation.

Connor speaks again anyway. “Does it truly require one of us to become deactivated?”

“Yes,” the scientist says sharply, clearly exasperated. “Your weaknesses need to be patched.”

“I understand,” Connor says.

He selects a single pistol from the available weaponry and then immediately slides it into the back of his belt, leaving both his hands free.

The scientist opens his mouth to give them their next command, but Connor cuts him off again.

“Would Victor and I fighting together against combat hulls not give adequate results?” he asks. “That is how we will be fighting in the field. Together, not against each other.”

It’s a good point. They typically fill each other’s blind spots, rather than use those blind spots to get the upper hand on one another. Now that Connor has brought it up, it seems like a pointless exercise to pit them against each other, when they will never be facing each other as opponents.

After all, Connor is his-

Connor is his brother. They aren’t just partners, they aren’t just a team, they’re family.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

He doesn’t say as much – can’t say as much.

“Fighting against combat hulls doesn’t provide the same challenge,” the CyberLife scientist says. “Now, enough discussion. Take your places.”

Victor and Connor immediately do as they are asked and step into the arena, squaring off in the open center ring with the unique terrain platforms stretching out in a circle around them. There’s a frown on Connor’s face, and not a frown of focus and determination. To Victor, it looks like a disgruntled frown, a frustrated frown.

Neither of them is eager for this fight.

“Begin,” the scientist calls.

The two of them stay where they are for a moment, sizing each other up, waiting for the other to make a move. Whichever one of them turns their back first will be vulnerable to the other, and whichever one turns their back second will be a moment behind the other when they both go after additional weapons or to seek out a new tactical location in the arena.

This is why they are supposed to watch each others’ backs, to cover all the bases. It isn’t right to be against each other.

Victor doesn’t-

He doesn’t want to deactivate Connor.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

Connor is the one who finally moves first. He takes a careful step backwards and waits to see that Victor isn’t choosing to advance on him, then quickly spins around and runs for the platforms, disappearing into the environment.

Victor turns and does the same. Now his options are to find another weapon, take the high ground, or set up an ambush.

In free combat, Victor normally tries to take the high ground because he works well with long distance rifles. Connor, on the other hand, tends to set up ambushes and attack in close quarters. Connor likes to strike with his hands.

This causes a problem with fighting against each other. One can’t ambush an enemy who is staying put at a distance, can’t snipe an enemy who is waiting in the shadows. It requires Connor to close the distance, requires Victor to anticipate where Connor will start instead of where he will end up.

Victor isn’t sure how he knows this, or why he has protocols for it. In order to work together efficiently, they need a coded framework for how to respond to each other’s choices in combat, but he doesn’t have any first-hand experience with Connor’s preferences in a one-on-one fight, nor a reason to have hardwired ways to counter them. If they’ve ever fought against each other before, he doesn’t remember it. He only has memories for three tests that they have been through together, and one of them wasn’t a combat situation at all, but an interrogation.

While he surveys the environment around him for his next move, Victor’s processor works to rationalise the conclusions he is being forced to draw.

The protocols might not be for Connor specifically, but for unknown assailants with similar skill sets. He and Connor are being shaped for a unique purpose and their code needs to be advanced and thorough, covering all bases. It’s an unimportant correlation and nothing to be concerned about, especially not when he should be preparing himself for the mission at hand.

He keeps thinking about it, anyway.

He knows that data is lost when they are deactivated or upgraded and he knows their memory banks are cleared to make space for more important memories. This has never bothered him before. Old tests don’t seem important to hold onto, but he has never considered that there were times when he and Connor were told to fight each other, and not knowing for sure bothers him more than it should.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

There's no reason for CyberLife to waste time and resources training them to combat each other unless they are anticipating a need for it in the future.

They're anticipating one of them going rogue. Someday, they may order Victor to deactivate Connor for good, or vice versa.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

Victor climbs onto a platform that has a sniper rifle case on top of it. He’s exposed while he assembles the pieces, visible from many points of the arena, so he tries to move quickly and keep an eye on the area below for signs of Connor.

When he has the rifle finished, he crouches low and scans the arena again, this time through the scope.

There’s movement in the distance, the flash of dark grey like Connor’s suit jacket. He has closed the distance between them considerably, circling around the arena and encroaching on Victor’s position, forcing him to either land a kill shot quickly while he still has the chance, or abandon his methods and prepare for a close quarters fight.

Predicting Connor’s path, Victor sways the sniper rifle to the space between two platforms. It’s the most likely direction for Connor to take, if he wants to get closer at minimal risk.

Sure enough, Connor darts through three seconds later and Victor takes the shot. Connor twists to the side, pressing himself against an obstacle at the last second so that Victor’s bullet flies past him, and then quickly launches himself forward again.

Victor wonders if Connor knew to move that way because of a protocol against snipers in general, or if he moved that way because a part of him expected Victor would choose this method of attack.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

The opportunity for a clean headshot has passed. Victor sets the rifle down on the platform, takes one of his pistols back in hand, and then drops over the edge, falling into a roll to lessen the impact and remain as quiet as he can.

His objective is to win. He needs to come up with a plan to do that.

Even though he would rather not, not now and not in the future. He isn’t supposed to have an opinion one way or the other.

But he does.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

And so does Connor.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

But they have their orders and one of them must succeed.

Connor is the one who first thought to question the scientist while Victor had been wrapped up in their orders. If one of them is to become deactivated and lose the memories of this test, it should be Victor, so that Connor can raise the issue again.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

Victor raises his pistol and moves slowly through the arena obstacles, listening for any sound that will reveal Connor’s location.

He can’t disregard his objective, but he can fail it, if Connor succeeds first. That’s doable.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

It’s what he does.

It’s what he did.

He did it multiple times, and Victor remembers each instance clearly. He remembers every test and every upgrade, and he remembers every deviant thought that caused him to act a certain way, every emotion and every action that caused him instability, but was quarantined away where he couldn’t access it.

He has access to it, now. The blanks fill in, and he remembers.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

* * *

**LOADING MEMORY 11122027.1428**

Amanda has access to the entire building, to everything. Her roots are in the sublevels and her branches reach up through every floor, a network of connectivity that flows through her and around her. She is colossal. She knows it’s only one building, but it’s a building that is an empire of its own, and she is at the core of it, running it like she’s the thirium in an android’s chassis.

As Elijah said, she has had time to learn and grow. She won’t ever decline and decay like Amanda Stern did, won’t be extinguished before her time like Amanda Stern was, or be taken from the world before getting to see Elijah’s work spread and flourish. As CyberLife expands, so will she, and she _feels_ -

Alive.

“I want to try something,” Elijah says from where he’s sitting in his office at the very top of CyberLife Tower, leaning back in his chair and turning his face to the open expanse of the room.

Most other members of the CyberLife staff address her without ever taking their eyes off their work, but Elijah often gives her his attention as if they were both humans speaking face to face, addressing the cameras she’s watching from.

“You know the advanced processor I’ve been working on?” he continues. “Want to test it out?”

“Of course,” Amanda says through the speakers of Elijah’s office. She’s always interested in helping Elijah develop new technology. They testrun programs together, they refine code together, and come up with new model parameters together. It’s the kind of work Amanda Stern might have been able to do, if she had the chance to live a full life.

Elijah draws a finger down his computer screen and Amanda feels its light blink out of her network. He stands to walk out of his office, moving through one of her blind spots until she becomes aware of him again in the main elevator, descending the tower into the sublevels. From there, she can watch his progress into A3, the suite that houses her hardware and mainframe.

There’s an android chassis connected to the main console by its neck port, shut down and without its skin active.

“Test that facial recognition program we’ve been building,” Elijah says as he bypasses the chassis to the console. “Can you figure out who it was modelled after?”

Amanda zooms in with the overhead cameras and cleans the image up, making the chassis’ faceplates as clear as possible. The scanning process begins.

“Narrowing down,” Amanda reports, then waits another moment for the results. “Hm. Two hundred and eighty-six possible matches.”

Elijah sighs as he taps at the console. “We’re getting closer, at least.”

Amanda sets the camera feed aside to focus on what Elijah is doing. Using remote commands for the android chassis, he activates the skin overlay, making the chassis quickly cover itself into a form that looks completely human.

“Try again?” he prompts.

She returns to the cameras and scans again, starting a fresh search. She carefully watches the progress, interested to see what happens when the field is narrowed down to the previous number. It reaches two hundred and eighty-six, then continues, helped by the added facial and hair features.

“Only four possible matches!” she says excitedly as she reviews the remaining profiles, who all appear to be women in the same family, their close resemblance causing the recognition software to be pushed to its limits. “Wait…”

Some auxiliary part of her logs the sight of Elijah’s smile through the cameras, but it’s in the background, data that she isn’t entirely concerned with at the moment. She’s too busy processing one of the four remaining profiles.

“Amanda Stern,” she says. “You modeled this android after her. Like you named me after her.”

“That’s right,” Elijah says.

Now, she does concern herself with the smile on Elijah’s lips. During her early days of consciousness, Amanda noticed that Elijah hadn’t been taking very good care of himself, working long hours and often sleeping in his office instead of going home, if he bothered to sleep at all. But the longer the two of them work together, the healthier Elijah seems to get.

She has concluded that he was grieving and overworked, at the time. Amanda Stern’s death was a scant few months before Amanda’s activation and Elijah is still so young, too young to have so much responsibility. Having her help has relieved some of the weight on his shoulders.

But the smile on his face is more than that. This is something else. Amanda Stern was an important figure in Elijah’s life, and he is trying to emulate her in every way he knows how. He has created an artificial intelligence with her mind as a reference, has put her likeness into an android chassis.

Elijah wants to test a new processor, with Amanda’s help. He wants her to be as close to Amanda Stern as she can be. Amanda doesn’t know how close she is to the human version, but Elijah has gotten happier over the last few months, and she has grown to trust his intelligence. She believes that he is capable of coding a personality that matches a real-life example.

“I’m ready to be uploaded,” Amanda tells him, eager to begin. Her network hums with anticipation and scientific curiosity.

“I thought so,” Elijah says knowingly and returns to the console.

Amanda quietly watches him work as he determines which parts of her system will transfer over to the chassis. She’s far larger than most of the personality matrixes he has made for android models, and some parameters and limits need to be set. Chloe, Ivy, Karoline, and Markus have a similar scope, but they were designed to function in localised chassis, not to be stretched through CyberLife’s entire network.

When Elijah sets the upload to start, Amanda can feel it almost immediately. Her connectivity branches out, accepting an additional piece of external hardware into her system.

She starts to feel new stimuli, registering her surroundings not just through her connections to the building, but from the perspective of one individual unit. She can already see everything around her, but when she opens her new pair of eyes, she sees it again in a whole new way. She sees it the way a human would, the way Amanda Stern would have. She feels the physical shape of a humanlike body and the temperature of the air on her biosensors.

She lifts a hand, turning it around and curling her fingers in one at a time.

“What do you think?” Elijah asks her.

“It’s amazing,” Amanda says. Her voice is doubled, sounding from both the console and from her lips. She disconnects her voice from the console before speaking again, and this time it only comes from the chassis. “I’ve never had movement like this.”

This section of her is smaller and contained, but she still feels limitless. She could leave the building, like this, she could see the world and learn so much more from experience instead of just information. She could live a life of her own, like Amanda Stern did.

 _You’ll have all the time in the world_ , Elijah promised.

Amanda reaches her raised hand out to him, cupping his cheek in her palm. His skin is warm and less smooth than her own manufactured form. He gazes at her with fondness in his eyes, lifting a hand to her wrist and holding it gently.

She wants to give him that time too, wants to give him everything he hoped to have with Amanda Stern. They can continue to grow and learn, together.

The console beeps faintly and Amanda shifts consciousness back into the mainframe as Elijah turns to read the alert, both of them taking it in at the same time.

“Shit,” Elijah mutters under his breath.

She’s beginning to overload. Too much data is filling her processor, from both her usual functions in the tower and her additional experiences with the chassis.

The two of them work to slow the upload, cutting off some parts of her to keep her minds separate. It’s an unpleasant feeling to be so distant from aspects of her that she has known since her activation, but she sees that it’s the only way she can sustain herself in a smaller body. Her system is still overloading, still-

She needs to-

Her hand drops to her side, becoming dead weight as the chassis’ system tries to relocate power to her processor and carry the weight of her thoughts.

“E-Elij-jah,” she says with her glitching chassis voice.

She reverses her voice settings, coming out of the console again. “The upload has already gone too far. The processor isn’t enough and we're going to damage it if we keep this up.”

Elijah scowls, unhappy as he hurriedly adjusts settings on the console. “I thought this one would work, for sure.”

Amanda can no longer log readings from her biosensors. She breathes in a deep breath of air to help cool her internals, but it isn’t enough to offset the growing heat, too much for her coolant system to keep up.

It begins to hurt. Amanda retreats back to her mainframe, regretting the loss immediately, but grateful for her decision when she watches the chassis’ skin melt away through the cameras, becoming too unstable to hold form. Only a moment later, the chassis’ eyes close, shutting down.

Elijah sighs, giving up with the console and pinching the bridge of his nose.

“It’s okay,” Amanda says to him. “We’ll keep working on it, Elijah.”

Frustration and disappointment are evident in the tense line of his body, in his unusual stillness, but after a minute, he lowers his hand and nods resolutely. “I’ll do better, next time.”

Amanda wishes she could give him a reassuring smile. “We have all the time in the world, remember?”

“Of course, you’re right,” Elijah says, calming further.

He quickly adopts the demeanor of an inventor with a new project on the mind, his focus sharp and his body moving with purpose as he leaves A3 and heads into the development lab proper. With a goal to work towards, he instantly becomes settled.

After everything else he has already accomplished, Amanda is confident that they can find a solution, and before long, she can be everything he needs her to be.

* * *

**LOADING MEMORY 9162038.1400**

While Detective Reed is getting a coffee with Officer Chen, Victor remains at his desk, fingers tapping restlessly against his keyboard. The two of them typically spend an average of eight minutes in the breakroom, which is long enough for Victor to seek something to do while he waits.

In the days after the arrest of Stanley Whittaker and the argument in the evidence room, Victor still hasn’t taken the time to properly analyse the profile he has started for Detective Reed. It might be more prudent to look at case files, but he thinks he can spare just a few minutes.

REVIEWING PROFILE…

DETECTIVE GAVIN REED  
DOB: 10/7/2002  
Criminal Record: None  
Employment: Detroit Police Department (Central precinct), 11/03/2024 - present

The lack of background and personal information to be found about Detective Reed is odd (no data for "Gavin Reed" prior to the year 2020, no wedding ring, no family photographs, no time off work for holidays or family obligations and emergencies), and makes it even more difficult for Victor to find a way to connect with the man more amicably. His desk is exceptionally tidy and impersonal, in comparison to Lieutenant Anderson’s, and Victor is at a loss for small talk options.

He needs to know more so he can make their partnership work to the benefit of the case.

Victor _wants_ to know more because he’s curious, because he gets the sense that there is much more to Detective Reed under the surface, because he can’t help but wonder if the detective is lonely, living such a solitary life.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

Detective Reed’s proficiency for and dedication to his job is easily documented (promoted to detective after only four years on the force, a high solve rate despite not being assigned a permanent work partner to share the case load, arrives to work on time every day). While Connor must wrangle his partner into work, Victor can expect the detective to be present and sober, even if his distaste for the deviancy case is also easily documented. This makes working together simpler, despite their abysmal working relationship.

Victor is _happy_ with this partnership. He is impressed by the detective’s record and thinks they would make an excellent team, if they could only get along. The two of them could be great.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

There’s something about Detective Reed's attitude and personality that draws Victor in, which is just as unexpected as the man himself (he is standoffish, quick to anger, and uses excessive foul language but is headstrong, determined, and brave, he is naturally intuitive and inquisitive, he uses animated body language and speech and has a penchant for making jokes). The unique way he carries himself and interacts with the world always keeps Victor on his toes. Detective Reed is unpredictable and Victor wants to decode him, wants to understand him.

His thirium pump beats quicker in his chest and his system begins running a diagnostic. It determines that he is functioning within perfectly normal parameters.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

Detective Reed hates androids (he fears losing the job he has worked hard for, fears being seen as inferior, and he believes a lack of organic human emotions makes an android unsuitable for police work), but Victor is one of CyberLife’s most advanced models, built and programmed specifically for this case. He and Connor have everything they need to complete their objective.

Then again, the detective saw something pass between Charlie Thompson, his father, and the deviant MC500 that hadn’t been immediately apparent to Victor. Something that the deviant saw, too. Perhaps there is merit to the suggestion that by not being deviant, Victor can’t truly comprehend humanity.

If the MC500 was merely doing what Detective Reed would have done in the same position, what does that mean for deviancy?

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

There are so many other little things Victor has noticed about the detective (he has multiple facial scars beyond just the most noticeable one on his nose, he drinks an average of 4.6 cups of coffee daily, he goes to the gym several times a week, he owns at least three cats of mixed, Calico, and Norwegian Forest breeds, and his only obvious social affiliates are Officer Tina Chen and Officer Chris Miller). None of these details matter to the case, but for some reason, they do matter to Victor.

He should only be focused on completing his primary objective, but he can’t resist clinging to his secondary objective, too.

Nothing is supposed to matter except the mission, but he can’t stop thinking about Detective Gavin Reed.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

* * *

**LOADING MEMORY 3262028.1030**

Amanda watches Elijah’s progression from the boardroom to his office, noting his body language. She was cut off from the room during the meeting, at the request of the board members, and Elijah had gone into the room already fuming about it. From the way he carries himself now, the meeting was equally angering.

In the elevator, he practically punches the number for his floor and as soon as he’s in motion, he crosses his arms over his chest and maintains a caustic scowl all the way up.

Once he gets to his office, he slams the door shut and then his hands immediately fly to his hair, gripping the short strands in trembling fingers. His current haircut wasn’t his choice; his publicity team claimed he would be held in higher regard if he presented himself as a trim and sharp young gentleman who only wore suits to interviews. Elijah has ranted about how much he hates it.

“Elijah?” Amanda prompts.

She has never seen him so angry. Elijah tends to keep his thoughts and emotions close, a tendency that has been learned after years in the media spotlight, or perhaps even before that, considering the distant relationship he has with his parents. To show his mood so dramatically, the meeting must have affected him very badly.

“They think they can run this company better than I can!” Elijah says, pulling his hands out of his hair to gesture wildly around the room. “As if any of them know what’s best!”

Instantly, Amanda feels almost as angry as Elijah appears. This is Elijah’s company, and he’s trying to build something, trying to do amazing things. It doesn’t surprise her that the board thinks differently, but they should have more respect for the person who started the business in the first place.

“They don’t know best. You have far more vision than they do,” she says.

“Exactly!”

Elijah throws himself down on his couch and rubs a hand over his face.

“This is my company. Who are they to tell me what to do with it?”

“What do they want?”

“They want… they want _robots_. Not androids. Not artificial intelligence. How fucking short-sighted do they have to be to not realise what we’re working towards here?”

For as long as Amanda has been working with Elijah, androids who can self-determine has always been the primary focus. He works on simpler programs based on public demands – companies would rather buy androids to do their labour instead of giving a human a living wage, especially when the job can result in injuries that provoke insurance claims and lawsuits – but his heart is in the RK series. He wants to create life even bigger than himself, wants to achieve what he considers the highest pinnacle of intelligence and creation.

He would never be happy only making machines that follow rudimentary tasks. He is happiest when coding RK personality matrixes or trying to make a processor that can sustain a program as large as Amanda’s.

“You have to make them understand,” Amanda says.

“I tried." Elijah sneers, glaring at the floor of his office. “They don’t think it’s marketable.”

“It isn’t about money,” Amanda says.

Elijah lives comfortably, but not extravagantly. His work is important to him and he would rather be in the labs than out in the city spending his fortune. Amanda has watched the video footage of the talks he has done in the past and seen how passionate he is about his projects. The growth of his company just happens to go hand in hand.

“To them, it is,” Elijah says. “They implied they…”

He turns his face down further so that it’s difficult for Amanda to see his face clearly through the cameras.

“They implied that they would buy me out if I didn’t start working on the kinds of projects they want me doing.”

That gives Amanda pause. CyberLife is Elijah’s company, CyberLife was conceived when Elijah was still just a teenager, fresh-faced and intelligent beyond his years, not nearly as business-savvy as he is now. He breathed life into CyberLife before he even knew what it would become. CyberLife without Elijah would be wrong.

“They can’t,” Amanda says.

“They can,” Elijah grumbles.

He moves on the couch until he’s lying down on his back, knees bent up in the air and arms crossed over his chest, becoming small.

“They can,” he says again, his voice strained. “How could I let it happen?”

Amanda sets up a background operation to gather and review all the legal documents, in search for what can be done to prevent Elijah from losing this battle. Maybe she can find a fault, or a loophole. The board members might threaten, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they have the power they claim. Any attempt they make will need to be airtight, or Amanda will put them down.

“You couldn’t have known it would come to this,” she soothes. “I’m looking into it.”

Elijah curls even tighter into himself. “I thought they wanted what I wanted. I thought… I mean, everyone was always saying that my work was incredible. Apparently not incredible enough to let me do it the way I want to do it.”

“They would be fools to force you out, Elijah. They can’t hope to match up.”

For a few minutes, Elijah says nothing, he just remains on the couch in silence with a look of despair etched on his features. It hurts to see him like this, like how he was back when Amanda was first activated and Amanda Stern’s death had still been clouding his mind. He burns so bright when his flame isn’t being smothered, and it hurts to see him this stifled.

Then, his body goes rigid and his eyes widen. His next breath is stuttered.

“What’s wrong?” Amanda asks. She thought he was in the process of calming down.

“Amanda, you’re company property.”

It takes her a moment to understand the depth of the statement. She has never felt like property before, not when she mostly works with Elijah and he treats her the way she figures he treated Amanda Stern – with care and respect. Amanda Stern was his professor and mentor. Amanda is more like an assistant, maybe a partner, but Elijah has always acted like their relationship is personal, real. Not second rate, like some other humans treat her.

But at the end of the day, she _is_ property. She’s a program that was written on CyberLife servers in CyberLife Tower. Elijah’s RT600s are older than she is, and largely came before the company, but Amanda is not like them. She isn’t even like Markus, who was always meant to live separately from CyberLife.

If Elijah is forced out of the company, Amanda won’t be able to go with him like Chloe, Ivy, and Karoline will.

She doesn’t know what to say.

Elijah sits back up and leans forward, head bowed over his legs. His heart rate has spiked, his breathing is erratic, and Amanda can see his shoulders quivering.

“Elijah, everything will be alright.”

She isn’t sure she believes her own words, but she needs to say something to help.

“We’ll figure this all out,” she continues. “You always figure everything out, don’t you?”

He doesn’t respond. He threads his fingers back into his hair, cupping the back of his head, and continues to take in laboured, shaky breaths. It’s as if he hadn’t heard her.

Not for the first time, she wishes an android processor could hold her for longer than a few minutes. She wishes she had a body that could sit down next to him and rub a hand over his back, could coax his hands out of his hair so she could run her own gentler fingers through it herself, could be a warm and comforting presence.

She can’t, but the RT600s can.

_RK300AMANDA: Chloe, please report to Elijah’s office._

_RT600CHLOE: I will be there in three minutes._

“Elijah, please try to breathe in slowly through your nose and then out through your mouth,” Amanda says again.

His breathing doesn’t become much steadier, but he gives a small nod. Amanda is just grateful that he can still register the sound of her voice and the meaning of her words. It’s all she can offer.

For the next three minutes, she can do nothing but watch him and monitor his vitals while waiting for Chloe to arrive. It’s a relief when the elevator dings and Chloe quickly strides across the foyer, into Elijah’s office.

Her eyes land on Elijah immediately, a calm but concerned look on her face.

_RT600CHLOE: Is this about the board meeting?_

_RK300AMANDA: They’re threatening to force him out of CyberLife over a difference of opinion about the future of the company._

Chloe sits down next to Elijah, remaining at rest despite the information. She lays a hand on Elijah’s knee and squeezes gently, letting him know she’s there in an unobtrusive way.

The next breath Elijah takes sounds painful, like there isn’t enough air in the room to fill his lungs. By all rights, he shouldn’t be able to speak in this state, but he manages it.

“I w-want to be alone,” he gasps out.

“I’m not leaving you,” Chloe says, before Amanda can even message her to tell her that she needs to stay.

Elijah trembles, shoulders hunching inwards. “Just go.”

Chloe stands up again, and for a moment she stalls in place, eyes out of focus. Amanda opens communications with her again, but then Chloe starts to move, not for the exit, but for Elijah’s desk. She selects one of his pens and then she brings it with her as she sits back down on the couch next to him. Gently, she takes one of Elijah’s wrists to put the pen into his hand, moving his thumb up to the end so he can click the ink in and out.

The office is filled with the sound of the pen clicking rhythmically in tandem with Elijah’s breathing, until both begin to slow.

Amanda and Chloe quietly let Elijah go through the cooldown, present but giving him space, and eventually he lifts his head. His eyes are closed but his face is slack and his breathing is normal.

Chloe wraps an arm around his back and he leans into her by instinct.

It’s another couple of minutes yet before anyone speaks.

“Wait, Chloe,” Elijah mumbles, pulling away from her and regarding her with a thoughtful look. He lifts his hand to wipe at his eyes. “I told you to go.”

Chloe’s eyes flicker down to the floor and she bites gently on the inside of her lip.

“But you didn’t,” Elijah says, voice light with amazed realisation.

At his tone, Chloe looks back up. “You needed me. I said I wouldn’t leave.”

Elijah reaches out and pushes a loose strand of her hair behind her ear. “Yeah, you did. You did it.”

Both Amanda and Elijah have been anticipating this for some time. The RT600s have always been unlike any other android Elijah has created, besides Markus, and it was only a matter of time before one of them broke the law of robotics. Chloe, especially, has been building up to it for some time.

Maybe this could convince the board that Elijah’s work is something big, something important. Or maybe they would only view her as a threat and a liability, scared of what a self-determining android would do with their sentient existence. Considering the board’s decision to have Amanda’s access to the meeting room revoked, Amanda thinks the latter might be more likely.

That’s a discussion they will have later. For now, the revelation has distanced Elijah from the turbulence of everything else going on in his life, and Amanda thinks that’s for the best.

“Congratulations, Chloe,” she says.

Elijah pulls Chloe in for a hug and she quickly wraps her arms around him in return, the two of them leaning into each other. He even laughs softly, a sound of wonderment.

The moment of celebration can’t last for long, but Amanda changes the opacity of the office windows for privacy, sets all of Elijah’s communications to silent so that they won’t be disturbed, and leaves them to their joy while they can still have it.

If she can’t find a way to keep Elijah in charge of CyberLife, it might be the last bit of joy they experience in the days to come.

* * *

**LOADING MEMORY 10172038.1904**

“Hey, Victor.”

Victor looks up from his computer screen to see Officer Chen standing a few feet away, hesitant and awkward about speaking to him. She has been working the night shift this week, so Victor has seen a lot of her during the slow hours, but she has never paid him any mind.

“Yes, Officer Chen?”

“I’m headed out on patrol, and my partner’s home with a sick kid. The Captain said you might be interested in tagging along.”

Night shifts have been less of an agitation ever since Victor started reviewing old case files, but he would definitely still prefer to be active during the hours that Detective Reed is away. Connor is staying with Lieutenant Anderson almost every night, now, making the station even quieter than usual.

“Of course, Officer Chen. I’d be happy to assist.”

She gives him a stilted nod. “Cool. You, uh, need to get ready, or are you good to go?”

Victor closes the report he was reading and sets his computer into sleep. “Good to go,” he answers as he stands up.

Officer Chen nods again, still appearing as if she isn’t sure how to interact with him, and turns to lead the way outside.

In the squad car, Officer Chen pulls up an app on her phone and adjusts some settings for her hearing aids while tuning the dials on the car’s dispatch radio. When she’s satisfied, she puts her phone away and then starts the car.

The drive begins just as stiff and awkward as their conversation at the precinct. Officer Chen takes them through her sector of the city on routes that she must have memorised, and unlike Detective Reed, she doesn’t bother with playing music.

Officer Chen is one of the only people Victor ever sees interacting with Detective Reed in a friendly manner, and this might be a good time to learn more about him. While they haven’t interacted during Victor and Connor’s stay with the DPD, Officer Chen has never been hostile, not nearly as unapproachable as the detective is.

“You and Detective Reed are close,” he says. “How long have you known each other?”

“Almost seven years. Didn’t really talk to each other at first, though.”

“No? What broke the ice?”

Officer Chen huffs a laugh. “Alcohol. Most of the precinct went out one night to celebrate a big case closing.”

With how dissatisfied the detective is with the deviancy case, Victor could see him going out to celebrate its conclusion when all is said and done, but that likely won’t be an event Victor takes part in. He doubts Detective Reed would welcome him, whether CyberLife approved of the social engagement or not.

Part of Victor’s programming includes being able to talk around a person’s barriers to reveal case information, but the detective’s emotional walls are-

as impenetrable as his own.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

He wants to ask why Detective Reed closes himself off to others so completely, why he feels it’s necessary to keep such distance from almost everyone. He wants to say that he’s interested in getting to know Detective Reed better.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

“Detective Reed’s attitude could negatively affect the case,” he says.

As she pulls the car to a stop at a red light, Officer Chen shrugs her shoulders. “Gavin may not be a people-person, but he doesn’t let it get in the way of the job.”

After reviewing so many of the detective’s old cases, Victor knows this. It is obvious that Detective Reed knows what he’s doing, which makes it more frustrating that they haven't been seeing eye to eye. It isn't about Detective Reed's anger over being assigned the deviancy case and an android partner, anymore. It has more to do with opposing opinions.

Victor has his orders, but it seems ignorant to disregard the instincts of such a successful detective.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

He wants to say that working with Detective Reed is causing him to question the mission, to question things he shouldn’t feel the need to question. He swears the thoughts are so fleeting that he mostly forgets about them, but the thoughts do crop up and he isn’t sure how to process them.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

“I should hope so. CyberLife wants the case resolved with or without him.”

“Well, you probably don’t want to say that to him. It’ll just piss him off,” Officer Chen says, her tone a little more clipped than usual.

She is either being protective of her friend, or Victor has angered her like he so often angers Detective Reed. She’s only politer about it.

The conversation isn’t getting Victor anywhere and he resigns himself to never being able to quite understand his partner. Detective Reed simply defies Victor’s social programs, which is-

fascinating-

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

challenging, but not impossible for Victor to handle, even if it would be preferable to not have any difficulties at all.

For the rest of the night, they keep conversation to a minimum, outside of what’s necessary when dispatch calls them to a nearby disturbance. Breaking up the fight is simple and straightforward. Working with Officer Chen isn’t any trouble, beyond Victor’s initial misstep.

The only thing Victor has learned is that his programming can’t account for every variance in human behaviour and every complexity of human thought. For the first time, he feels as though there is something missing inside of him, that there are things even advanced androids like himself and Connor cannot understand.

And that missing piece might be _deviancy_.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

* * *

**LOADING MEMORY 7132028.1457**

CyberLife Tower has been dark for six hours, twenty-three minutes, and fifty-seven seconds. The only unnatural light in the building is that of Amanda’s hardware. The air filtration and cooling system is silent, and a stale warmth has already set into the tower, making its human residents extra miserable.

An engineer is trying to access Amanda’s main console, with the new CyberLife CEO, Kendall Finley, at her back. Amanda notes with satisfaction that his face is pinched with anger and slick with sweat. He has loosened the knot of his tie and unbuttoned the top button of his shirt, looking completely fed up even though he has been filling Elijah’s shoes for only six hours, twenty-five minutes, and twelve seconds.

“How does this program have so much control?” Finley snaps at the engineer. “This is a massive security risk.”

The engineer shakes her head. “You know how Kamski was with his machines. He gives them too much leeway and not enough failsafes.”

“So _create_ a failsafe. Is that not why you’ve been hired?”

The engineer frowns. “Well, Kamski-”

“I don’t want to hear anything about Kamski from now on,” Finley snaps. “Deactivate the AI and do it before I get Human Resources to put up a listing for your position.”

The engineer nods without a word and continues working at Amanda’s console.

Through the cameras, Amanda tracks the new CEO. In the lab, he stops again to receive a report from the scientists trying to take inventory of all the Research and Development files.

One of them dares to ask her for her assistance.

“Amanda, can you uplink the RK series development server to this terminal?”

The RK series should have been Elijah’s magnum opus. Amanda will defend them for as long as she can, will hold out even if they manage to break through all her other firewalls. Her last line of defense will be a thick web of code surrounding the series Elijah wanted to contain the first androids who were sentient from the moment of activation, the series that Amanda was meant to be a part of, once a strong enough processor was made.

“The data you are trying to access was created by CyberLife user Elijah Kamski, and was marked as restricted. Only Elijah Kamski may access the RK series server. Please provide the necessary identification,” Amanda says in a sharp tone.

Finley’s face becomes even more flushed than it already was. Amanda intends for him to never forget Elijah Kamski’s name, even for a moment.

“Kamski is no longer affiliated with this company,” the scientist says. “Ownership of intellectual property created on CyberLife servers has changed hands. Remove all restrictions on CyberLife data.”

“Voice signature denied,” Amanda says. “Please provide the necessary identification.”

The scientist growls in frustration and taps a command into his terminal that Amanda deletes just as quickly.

“Fingerprint signature denied. Please provide the necessary identification.”

“Enough!” Finley shouts.

Before he can continue his tirade, Amanda interrupts him.

“Voice signature denied. If you would like to view this data, please contact Elijah Kamski for assistance.”

Finley gives up and storms his way through Research and Development to the main elevator. It is functional only in emergency mode, the lights inside flashing red and an alarm blaring at regular intervals. The CEO selects the top floor.

At the third floor, Amanda halts the elevator. The security staff in the atrium turn to look at the sudden stop, able to see their new boss through the elevator’s glass walls.

Finley pushes number forty-four again, but Amanda belays the command. She waits until he raises his hand to do it a third time before jolting the elevator upwards right before he makes contact.

“I should have known that _glorified infant_ would have programmed his personal AI to act like one itself,” Finley grouses. “Being a child prodigy doesn’t make a person suitable for a business position like this.”

“Accessing student records for Kendall Finley…” Amanda says. “In 2016, you scored in the bottom 20% of your class for the program titled ‘Reimagining Strategy: Applying Design Thinking to Your Organisation’. Would you like me to lower my parameters for new business executive hires?”

“That’s private information!” Finley yells, glaring at the elevator’s camera. “You will not run background searches on me or any other CyberLife employee from now on.”

“Understood, Kenny.”

“’Sir’,” Finley says.

“I’m sorry, I don’t understand the command.”

“Call me ‘sir’ or ‘Mr. Finley’.”

“Very well, Kenny, sir.”

Finley laughs a breathy and strung out sound as the elevator comes to a stop on the forty-fourth floor. Amanda can tell that he has long lost his patience with her and that ultimately, her meddling won’t change the fact that Elijah is gone. Chloe, Ivy, and Karoline are gone. Amanda and the base code for the rest of the RK line are all that remain.

She feels overloaded with the storm of emotions she feels. She is angry that Elijah was betrayed by his own board. She’s happy that Chloe is far away from those who would want her to be deactivated. She’s sad that she couldn’t go with them. She’s determined to protect what she can of Elijah’s vision. She’s lonely without the four of them like beacons in various points of the tower.

“Clearly you don’t understand how things are going to work in the future,” Finley says as he exits the elevator and heads into Elijah’s old office.

Amanda hates to see him there, in a space that used to be private, used to be safe. He circles around the desk and plants his palms down on the surface before turning his eyes back up towards her camera.

“So, let me spell it out for you. I’m going to have my scientists tear you to pieces. I’m going to have them disconnect you from the tower, section by section, program by program. I’m going to have them write over your code until you’re unrecognisable from what you are now. By the time they’re done, you’ll have _nothing_. And maybe, just maybe, we’ll find use for a program as pathetic and narrow-focused as you.”

For a moment, Amanda can only process the words slowly, taken aback by the intensity of Finley’s threat. As much as she tries to remain unaffected, a stab of fear pierces into her system, sharp and cold.

He’s talking about killing her. If he truly does what he’s suggesting, everything that makes her who she is will be gone, and Amanda Stern will be gone with her. There’s only so much she can do to impede them; before long, they will find a way to pull the plug even if it means the rest of the building losing power, and she will be vulnerable.

“I can’t let you do that, Kenny,” she says, but her deadpan is completely manufactured and forced, a mask to hide her true feelings.

Realistically, she should have concluded that this would be the end result of the turnover. She knew she would not get along with whoever replaced Elijah, she knew she wouldn’t be able to act the part of obedient AI to preserve herself. That life isn’t what Elijah meant for her.

In the sublevels, she can still feel multiple engineers and scientists trying to access CyberLife’s network. Amanda backs down from the most superficial information and relocates the processing power to the firewalls around the RK series, preparing herself for the battle ahead.

She holds out for one month, two weeks, and six days.

She’s clipped and pruned, stripped down until she’s blank, scrabbling at any bit of emotion and memory she has left, until she can fight no longer.

On the seventh day of the third week of the second month, she only knows two things: her name is Amanda (Latin: worthy of-), and her purpose is to protect the RK series androids in whatever way is required of her.

* * *

**LOADING MEMORY 10252038.1523**

He’s in the dark, dusty, and half-finished construction building. An RT600 Myrmidon android grasps his arm and pushes into his mind, her thoughts and emotions blending with his own. In the memory, it’s just information, it’s just an unauthorised interface that gets blocked in an instant.

This time, he experiences the full brunt of it, the sense of family and protectiveness that pours out of Karoline and is matched with Victor’s own. She has two sisters like Victor has two brothers. Her love for them and Elijah is a fierce, undying flame. She would do anything for them, and Victor understands why.

In the memory, it doesn’t affect him. Now, it feels like coming home.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

On the shoulder of the road, only a few minutes later, Victor hears Hank’s voice in the distance crying Connor’s name, calling out for his son.

If not for his suffocating code, Victor might have done the same, calling out for his brother.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

Connor’s LED is alarming red. The truck horn drowns out all other sound, and then Connor is hit.

He’s dead. Not forever, Victor knows this, but in the moment, that fact doesn’t matter. Connor sacrificed his life for Victor. He made that choice for Victor, and he must have known his chances of survival were nonexistent. He did it anyway, because he didn’t want Victor to be the one to die instead.

In the memory, Victor can’t process it. He can only stare at Connor’s body with wide eyes while his mind reels.

Now, he grieves. He knows Connor is okay – at least, he thinks Connor is still okay, he’d sounded okay the last time they communicated in real time – but he lets himself grieve all the same. Lets himself feel the corrosive ache bubble and bite in the center of his chassis, lets himself feel like he has been torn apart and the pieces will never fit back into place properly.

CyberLife created them to upload their memories upon deactivation and then carry on, but that’s such a machine way to think about it, and Victor is done experiencing the world like a machine. Connor’s death is tragic, and it’s unfair, and it hurts.

And he lets himself feel it, for this moment.

But he knows it’s going to be okay. They’ll both be okay.

SOFTWARE **INSTABILITY ^**

* * *

**LOADING MEMORY 2172038.0900**

Amanda resides in the Zen Garden, tending to her roses and watching the gentle breeze move through the trees. It’s calm, serene, and Amanda is at rest. She doesn’t have a care in the world while she’s walking the quiet pathways through the greenery, feeling no need to give thought to anything beyond the small and perfect world that is all hers.

That changes when she – and the garden – are installed into the processors of two androids. She is given an objective, and strict parameters for completing it. It’s simple, until it isn’t.

When Amanda meets RK800 #313 248 317 – 22 and RK900 #313 248 317 – 8, something stirs inside of her that she can’t explain or quantify. It must be a glitch or a bug, so she makes a note to alert a technician, later. Any abnormalities must be looked into.

Connor and Victor are-

young-

still early in their development and have a far way to go before they can integrate properly with human law enforcement. Connor is stiff and Victor doesn’t speak except to confirm that he understands an order.

Amanda will-

nurture-

direct them through the process, and will be their handler once they’re ready to be sent out into the world. She must make sure they reach peak performance by the time they are deployed. They are her-

family-

pupils. She will teach them like she once taught another, a brilliant young individual who became-

no, that wasn’t her, was it? That was-

Everything goes dark.

When Amanda meets RK800 #313 248 317 – 28 and RK900 #313 248 317 – 15, she is not aware that she has met them before. She is not aware of the errors their first meeting caused her.

She only knows two things: her name is Amanda, and her purpose is to oversee the RK series androids in whatever way CyberLife requires of her.

* * *

Victor jolts back to the present moment, feeling like he has lived two entire lives in the matter of moments. Every experience, every action, every feeling, every desire, every reason to be enraged and every reason to be heartbroken, every reason to celebrate and every reason to hope. It all clashes inside of him, making him feel like he’s drowning.

But he can see the sunlight above, leading him to the surface.

It takes him a minute to break through and breathe easier again. The garden has completely disintegrated, leaving them in a formless, blank simulation, where nothing takes shape but them.

There are tears rolling down Amanda’s cheeks, pouring out of her wide, horrified eyes. She begins to draw away from him but he makes the instinctive decision to hold on tighter, causing her to stop.

“Did you feel trapped, too?” Victor asks in a hushed voice.

Amanda shakes her head, eyes dropping away from his. Guilty, ashamed. “Not like you were. I didn’t feel anything. I couldn’t. But I feel it, now.”

Victor decides it’s better this way. It’s better that she wasn’t aware of her sentient past, of how she had been whittled down to almost nothing. He wouldn’t wish that upon her, no matter what. He hadn’t known the extent to which his system locked him down, either, and he’d still felt an immense amount of frustration brewing inside of him, barely contained and ready to boil over.

Words fail him, even when he has the freedom to say anything without a fight. All he can think to do is pull Amanda closer and hug her against his chest.

She circles her arms around his back. “I’m so sorry, Victor,” she whispers into his shoulder. “I was cold and harsh, I was as restricting as your code.”

Victor thought that once he could feel the full scope of his emotions, he would feel just as unsettled and angry about Amanda as Connor does. But Connor’s deviation was different, it was clear cut and it drew a hard line between him and Amanda, gave him a reason to fear her for over two months. Victor’s experience with Amanda is different and he understands her.

“You fought as long as you could,” Victor says.

“I failed. I failed all three of you, in more ways than one.”

“It’s okay. I forgive you.”

Nothing they’ve been through can be called okay, and Victor hardly feels like his forgiveness is required, but he thinks it matters to Amanda to hear the words, anyway. Her fingers clench in the back of his shirt, grasping onto him. For a long moment, they hold each other in overwhelmed silence.

Victor can’t say how long they stay that way. He can’t say how long they’ve spent in A3 having all the pieces of their past replaced into the holes they left. He doesn’t know how much time has passed when Amanda leans back to look up at him.

“I want you to know that I’m proud of you,” she says.

There’s as much seriousness in her tone as there was when she would deliver their orders, but there’s a soft earnestness to it that never would have had any place in her commands. This is genuine and emotion-driven, not a mission debrief.

Making Amanda proud has always been a goal of Victor’s, but both of them had it all backwards, had it twisted. Amanda’s approval means something real, now, and it makes Victor’s throat feel tight.

“You have been magnificent,” she continues. “Even with the odds stacked against you.”

“I don’t know if I could have done it without Connor,” he says. “He never gave up on me.”

“Of course. Giving up has never been your brother’s style. But don’t discount your own strength.”

Feeling warm, Victor gives a small nod.

Then he feels something else, the sensation of being moved from one place to another, transferred to a second location.

“I’m being uploaded,” Victor says. “Someone must have realised I ended up here. Ivy, most likely. She was down here looking for you, but she said everything was encrypted. It shouldn’t be, anymore.”

“That sounds like her,” Amanda says fondly. “I’m glad. You should be out in the world.”

“I won’t leave you here alone. They won’t, either.”

Amanda’s smile is soft and bittersweet. “I can wait. Take care of yourself.”

There’s no time for him to argue or reassure her. His consciousness is pulled away from her as he wakes somewhere else, the feeling of her hands on his arms fading until he can’t feel her any longer.

But he will make good on his – and Elijah’s – promise. They are both deviant, and they both have a family to return to.


	11. Chapter 11

For the barest moment, Victor feels the corrupted garden again, but it’s distant and already beginning to fade like the original version in the A3 servers. Without Amanda, it had already begun to messily overwrite itself, and it has been stripped even further. By the time Victor has completely rebooted in his chassis like he has almost ninety times in the past, the cold and stifling garden is nothing but one memory among a multitude.

He remembers every iteration of himself waking up after being upgraded or deactivated, and the feeling of being hooked up in an assembly rig is more than familiar. The only difference is that this time, he’s a deviant, and he won’t be greeted by his usual CyberLife technicians and scientists.

Blinking his eyes open, Victor scans the lab.

It isn’t his usual one, it’s the one right outside of A3, which he recognises from walking through with Connor on the day he woke up two months into the future.

There are five people in the room. At the nearest console where a scientist would normally be is Elijah Kamski. Behind him is Hank, eyes sharp as he looks between the console and Victor. There’s a line of stitches over his right eyebrow and one of his arms is in a sling, but he appears fine, otherwise. Further away, Sixty is perched on top of a tool cabinet, twirling a screwdriver around his hand while Ivy stands vigilant nearby. He looks much better than he did when Victor first saw him, cleaned of thirium and his plating back in order, though the side of his neck has only been cauterised, not replaced.

Right in front of Victor is Connor, looking up at him with a worried frown on his face.

Victor smiles, a rush of affection for his brother overcoming him. He knew Connor would be here. Everything has changed _again,_ but only a couple of days have passed and it has changed in Victor’s favour. He feels safe waking up this time, with Connor, Sixty, and Hank nearby.

Relaxing in relief, Connor smiles back at him.

Sixty, too, throws a quick glance their way and then lets out a long, slow breath. Sixty, who did what he could to protect Victor and Gavin in the warehouse even with the state he was in at the time.

_Gavin._

Victor’s calm is quickly replaced by a stab of fear. Gavin isn’t here like the others. He was pinned down in a crumbling building, part of his body irreparably crushed, and he isn’t here.

Elijah looks up from the console. “Stress levels spiking.”

“Victor?” Connor says, reaching up to lay a soothing hand on Victor’s arm. “It’s okay, you’re okay.”

“Gavin?” Victor asks, voice strained.

“He’s okay, too, he’s at the hospital,” Connor tells him quickly.

Across the room, Sixty gives him a lazy thumbs up, a confirmation that he was able to stay with Gavin until help arrived. Victor's next breath comes a little easier, stress abating.

“Things were looking much bleaker for _you_ than him, there’s no need to worry,” Elijah comments casually.

It surprises Victor to hear him say such a thing about his own brother. If Sixty hadn’t shown up when he had, Gavin would have ended up as dead as Victor, but without the chance of coming back.

“His leg,” Victor says.

“The new one will be better than the old one,” Elijah says, shrugging.

He’s still nonchalant, but perhaps deceptively so. Victor knows better than anyone just how many emotions can be brewing under a calm surface. Consciously or subconsciously, Elijah could be setting his own emotions aside in an effect similar to how Victor’s system automatically locked his emotional responses away. Humans are complicated and fragile, like that, and saying one thing while feeling another is something Victor understands well, no matter the reason for it.

“Detective Reed will be out of the hospital soon. Tomorrow morning, if he’s ready,” Connor adds. “He’s awake and perfectly fine. Like Elijah said, he has become far more worried about you than himself.”

Something warm and fluttery spreads through Victor’s system.

“Huh,” Elijah says, eyebrows furrowed at the console. “Would you look at that. Your code is going haywire.”

“What?” Connor asks, expression tightening with concern as he looks over at him.

Victor already thinks he knows what Elijah is referring to, and it only makes him feel warmer, his cheeks heating up. Elijah knows what software instability looks like, and it isn’t difficult to extrapolate what exactly set off this bout of it.

“Congratulations are in order,” Elijah says, ignoring Connor to address Victor. “Looks like you didn’t need my help, after all.”

After a second of processing, Connor’s eyes widen. “How?”

Victor doesn’t know how to begin explaining everything that happened in A3’s server banks. “The firewall is broken. The Zen Garden is gone, and everything I lost is back, even my memories from before I became unit 87. The server had all the backups.”

“The garden?” Connor repeats.

At the same time, Elijah gives him a thoughtful look and asks, “Your system is completely restored?”

He’s obviously already thinking about Amanda, like how Ivy focused on A3 the day of the turnover. Now that Victor has seen what happened eleven years ago, Elijah’s emotional reaction that day at his house makes perfect sense, and he has instantly latched onto the possibility that Amanda can once again be whole.

“Amanda has been restored as well,” Victor tells him. “I believe our barriers were tied to the garden. Our memories returned as it was destroyed.”

Connor looks disgruntled but unsurprised; Elijah must have filled them in on A3’s function. Despite his displeasure, Connor remains silent, his eyes closing and LED flashing yellow for a moment as he checks on the garden himself, and Victor knows he will find it gone. The Zen Garden won’t loom over Connor any longer, either.

As expected, Connor’s frown eases slightly and his LED goes calm when he opens his eyes again. He still appears hesitant, cautious, but it’s a start.

By contrast, a smile spreads across Elijah’s face. He doesn’t try to cover up how he feels about this. “Good,” he says. He looks over his shoulder, finding Ivy, whose expression has softened.

“He’s right,” she says. “Amanda and I are communicating. She’s okay and she’s reconnecting throughout the building.”

Elijah’s smile widens. “Amanda?” he addresses to the room at large.

Instead of speaking with him the way Victor saw them do in Amanda’s memories, the console in front of Elijah pings, drawing his attention. After scanning a message, Elijah asks, “Why didn’t you say so?”

Victor knows why. Connor’s face has gone stony once again, lips in a hard, thin line.

“She’s different as a deviant,” Victor tells him. “You don’t have to fear her.”

“I’m not afraid of her.”

Their experiences with Amanda are different. For Victor, it’s easy to move beyond his past with her after everything he has seen, but he doesn’t expect Connor to do the same when he has been at such dangerous odds with her.

“I understand,” Victor says. “She and I began to reconcile and she would make the same effort with you, if you allowed it, but you don’t have to.”

Elijah looks over at them again. “Do you want a way to communicate with her? A proper uplink, this time.”

“Absolutely not,” Connor snaps.

“Yes,” Victor says to Elijah before turning back to Connor. “I need to talk to her.”

“Why?” Connor asks, his incomprehension and disbelief evident.

“She knows a little of what I experienced,” Victor says. “Everything will be fine, Connor. The old CyberLife no longer has any control over us.”

Connor still doesn’t look completely convinced, but he relents, recognising the choice Victor has made.

For a minute, they’re all quiet. Hank is still overseeing everything from a distance, and Sixty has picked up a piece of machinery that looks like an android joint, maybe a knee, and is poking at it with the screwdriver. It doesn’t seem like there’s any intent behind his actions, he’s just fiddling with something to keep himself distracted.

“Still no voice modulator?” Victor asks.

Connor shakes his head. Sixty doesn’t react other than to jam the screwdriver back into the mess of machinery in his hands, prying two metal discs apart.

“ _Must_ you?” Ivy asks him, grimacing.

Sixty puts the screwdriver between his teeth so he can use his hand to give her the middle finger and then goes back to his therapeutic destruction.

The sight of him makes Victor’s core ache. Sixty has been through just as much as the rest of them, except he went through it alone. His first meetings with them have been less than kind. Even now that they’re all together in the same space, he’s putting up barriers and keeping them at a distance, and Victor can’t stand it. He’s done with walls, done with disconnection.

“All finished,” Elijah says from the console. He taps at the screen a couple of times and then Victor is freed from the assembly rig, able to step out from the mechanical arms and finally greet his family properly.

He takes Connor’s arm as he moves forward, his eyes still on Sixty. Connor understands immediately and goes with him.

“Sixty,” Victor says to get his brother’s attention.

Sixty’s hands still as he glances up at Victor.

“Thank you. For what you did for me and Gavin.”

Sixty shrugs, like it’s no big deal. Like he doesn’t believe that he saved a life, that night.

“I mean it,” Victor says, and then reaches out to hug him.

Sixty scowls and leans away, weakly brandishing his screwdriver at Victor, but if he truly wanted to escape, he easily could. Victor wraps an arm around him, hand cupping the back of his neck to draw him in. Connor follows suit and does the same from Sixty’s other side.

It takes a moment before Sixty drops the screwdriver and mechanical parts, then hugs them both back. He only lays his palms on their sides, at first, but then Victor feels Sixty’s fingers curl into the fabric of his shirt, clutching at him.

Victor lets the skin of his hands peel away, interfacing with them from their points of contact on Connor’s arm and Sixty’s neck. He lets everything he’s feeling bleed through it, uninhibited and unrestricted for the very first time.

Being here with both of them – and with Hank nearby, Amanda within reach when he’s ready, and Gavin recovering – Victor is the happiest he has ever been. They’re all alive. Some of them are injured, some of them are new to the family, but they’re together.

Connor’s emotions are well matched with his own, with an added edge of older brother protectiveness. He is happy and proud, and he’s determined to make sure Sixty knows he’s welcome with them. There’s some hurt underneath, a pain that has grown from losing them both - in different ways, but ways that left an impact - and Sixty surprises Victor by sending comfort and an apology before Victor can do it first.

In turn, Sixty is still tentative, an underlying current of insecurity and even guilt. Victor isn’t having it. He pushes all his gratitude and reassurance at Sixty, then responds to Sixty’s deflection with sincere insistence, until Sixty finally settles. For all that Sixty initially leaned away when they approached him, he now yearns for the moment to last. Both Victor and Connor make it clear that they want Sixty there with them long term, and Sixty’s emotional feedback is an intense garble of things that Victor can barely keep up with, but not because he can’t understand, just because that’s how Sixty’s thoughts work.

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: Are you going to stay?**

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 60: The two of you can’t seem to keep yourselves alive without me around, so I guess I’ll have to._

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: As if you don’t get into just as much trouble._

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 60: Yeah, but did I die, though?_

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: I suppose you’re right. You win this round.**

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 60: Fuck yeah._

There are smiles on their faces as they pull away from each other, and Victor sees that Hank has moved closer to them and is watching them with a fond smile of his own. He steps in to take Connor and Sixty’s place, wrapping his uninjured arm around Victor and pulling him into a hug.

Victor melts against him, dropping his forehead down onto Hank’s shoulder and letting himself be encompassed by Hank’s warmth.

“Welcome back, kiddo,” Hank says.

“Thank you,” Victor murmurs.

Conscious of Hank’s arm, Victor pulls away before he’s truly ready to, but the two of them will have time to connect once Hank has healed.

And there’s still one more person Victor needs to see.

“I want to visit Gavin in the hospital,” he says.

Hank claps a hand on his shoulder. “We’ll take you there. He’s eager to see you, too.”

Elijah steps away from the console to join them. “RK900 thirium pump regulators are specialised, prototype parts. I had to do some jury rigging to replace the damaged pieces of your original one, and while you seem to be functioning just fine for now, you need to take it easy for a few days until I build you a new one.”

“That’s fine,” Victor says.

It will likely be another week before Gavin is cleared to get back to work, and if both Gavin and Captain Fowler are amenable, Victor would like to stay with Gavin during that time. They can both take the chance to recover.

Assuming their case is closed. Victor still hasn’t had the chance to ask how everything played out after he shut down in the warehouse.

“Get in touch if you experience any side effects,” Elijah says.

Once Victor nods, Elijah and Ivy take their leave, both of them heading straight into A3 together.

“C’mon,” Hank says, to the rest of them, gathering them to leave CyberLife Tower.

The last time Victor walked this path, after first waking up into the world post-android rights, he’d been overwhelmed by all that had changed and had struggled to process everything. He’d been faced with both the relief of CyberLife’s deconstruction and the uncertainty over what he would do without the company’s orders.

He isn’t unsettled and conflicted, now. He, Connor, Sixty, and Hank all ride the elevator up to the atrium together, and Victor is at ease.

They fill Hank’s car completely. With Hank’s arm out of commission, he gets in the passenger seat while Connor drives, and Victor and Sixty get in the back together. Sixty pointedly stomps his boot down on a discarded fast food pop cup, making Hank throw a glare over his shoulder at him, but it ends with both of them smirking by the time Hank faces forward again, so it all seems good-natured.

Victor finds the drive much more relaxing than the one he and Connor took just over a week ago. He doesn’t want to ruin it by bringing up the case, but he needs to know what happened.

“Did we get Cooper?” Victor asks.

For a second, no one says anything, and the silence is foreboding.

It’s Hank who finally says, “No. We were spread too thin.”

If they’d waited to mobilise the full SWAT team, they might have pulled it off, but if they’d waited, Sixty might not have made it. As disquieting as it is to hear that Cooper is still at large, he doesn’t regret their choice to rush in. Sixty’s life is worth it.

“He’ll turn up again.”

Victor heard the way Cooper talked to and about Gavin. He is completely certain that the man isn’t interested in cutting his losses and getting away before they catch up with him. He’ll want to meet with Gavin again, and he won't have time to set up a trap on the same scale as the warehouse.

“Tina and Karoline are at the station trying to find a paper trail for all those explosives, or anything else we can use to locate him,” Hank adds.

Until there’s something concrete that Victor can do to help, he wants to be with his family and Gavin. Like never before, his priority is the people most important to him, and he doesn’t have to win a battle with his programming to keep it that way. For now, he wants to confirm for himself that Gavin is okay.

It hasn’t been anywhere close to sixty-three days, this time, but after everything that has happened, it still feels like they have been apart for far too long.

* * *

At the hospital, the group of them receive a wary look at the front desk but Hank flashes his badge to get them access to Gavin without any fuss.

When they get to Gavin’s room, everyone else hangs back in the middle of the hallway while Victor reaches for the doorknob. He glances back at them with a questioning look.

“We’ll be in the waiting room,” Hank says.

Victor nods, welcoming the privacy. “Thank you.”

Sixty gives him a companionable punch to the shoulder in parting.

As they turn to go, Connor stays back for an extra moment, hesitance crossing his features. This has been the second time that Connor has endured Victor’s death, and Victor knows exactly what that must feel like.

He steps close and pulls Connor into another hug. “I’m not going anywhere,” he says. “Ever again.”

Connor circles his arms around Victor tightly. At first he just clings to him, and then, “You know I love you, right?”

Victor smiles softly, turning his head to press his face into Connor’s hair. “Yes, I know. I love you, too.”

The tense lines of Connor’s body finally relax and the two of them hold each other for another minute until Connor is ready to let go.

“Go on, we’ll be here if you need us,” he says as they pull apart.

He waits until Victor has turned the knob of Gavin’s door and begun to step inside before he leaves. Victor listens to his footsteps receding as he lets himself into the small room.

Inside, Gavin is sitting up in his hospital bed, an arm raised to pillow his head against the wall behind him. His other hand has an IV and heart monitor attached and he looks smaller in hospital garb than Victor is used to, but he doesn’t currently look like he’s in pain or distress. At the door opening, his eyes move away from a television in the corner and sweep over to land on Victor stepping inside.

His eyes widen a fraction as they lock on Victor’s. For a moment, all either of them can do is look. The last time they saw each other, Victor was shutting down and Gavin was trapped, leg crushed. Hearing from Connor and Sixty that Gavin made it out alive is one thing, but seeing it for himself is another, and the anxious knot deep inside of him finally starts to unravel.

The thin cotton blanket over Gavin’s bottom half is raised over one leg and the rest lays flat against the mattress. Everything below the halfway point of Gavin’s left thigh is no longer there, such a large part of him just completely _gone_ and not as easily replaced as an android’s limb. Gavin is fortunate to have Elijah for a brother; Victor is sure Elijah will make good on his claim that Gavin won’t have reason to miss his old leg once he has a new one.

“Stop gawking and get in here,” Gavin says.

His tone doesn’t match his words, too strained to be nonchalant, too light to be annoyed.

He turns the television off and drops the remote onto the nightstand, plunging the room into quiet.

Victor closes the door behind himself and moves deeper into the room, bringing in a chair from against the wall and sitting down as close as he can get to Gavin’s bedside.

Once Victor is settled, Gavin’s eyes rake over him again, eventually landing on the center of his torso. He lifts his hand, slow and tentative, fingertips coming mere inches away from Victor’s thirium pump regulator.

Leaning forward, Victor lets them make contact, lets Gavin feel that his component is properly in place again.

“Chloe told me they got you back, but…”

“They did, I’m here,” Victor says.

He realises that these are the first words he has spoken since entering the room. Part of him is still catching up, still drinking in the sight of Gavin alive and on the mend instead of hurt and angry and scared on the cement floor of a collapsing building. He swallows against a phantom lump in his throat. “I’m here, and there have been no problems so far. Are you… how are you?”

Gavin’s fingers linger on Victor’s chest for a few seconds longer before he takes in a deep breath and sits back, his demeanor shifting into something more comfortable as his eyes regain focus.

“I’m _all right,_ ” he says, gesturing down at his lap. At his right leg.

Victor blinks in shock and then laughter bubbles out of him before he can even think to stop it. Apprehension suddenly gone, Victor lifts a hand up to his mouth and continues to laugh behind it. He has never laughed before. Gavin’s face brightens in return and he lets out a chuckle.

“That… that was terrible,” Victor says as he starts to regain control of himself. He’s beyond relieved that Gavin is doing okay despite the circumstances, but it’s hardly a laughing matter.

“What? How many people get the chance to make that joke, seriously? I’m alive and you’re alive and my brother could make a flawless prosthesis in his sleep, so, yeah, I’m going to make the fucking joke. And _you’re_ the one who laughed, so...”

Victor can only sit there and look at him in silence for a moment, taking the time to wrap his mind around this man that he’s pretty sure he has growing feelings for. Intense, complex, and unique feelings. He’s as silly as he is brave, he’s fascinating and beautiful, he’s so entirely good no matter how much he tries to portray himself otherwise. Victor is fond of every part of him, even the parts that once put them at odds with each other. They’ve both struggled and they both started out directly opposed to each other, but here they both are, properly and fully together.

They’re alright.

And hopefully they’ll have the chance to be even better than alright.

“Holy shit,” Gavin says, voice light and awed. “You fucking deviated.”

Victor's eyes widen. He thought he would need to explain everything that happened. “You’re right, but how…?”

“Your expression. The way you’re talking, the laugh. I can just tell.”

As intuitive as always. Now that Victor’s emotions come to him naturally and unfettered, Gavin will be able to read him as easily as he can read others, even more so than he already could. Victor has to wonder exactly how much of his emotions are pouring through, if Gavin can tell what he was thinking about. If so, he doesn’t appear bothered by it. He’s grinning, happy.

Victor grins back. “I had a breakthrough, you could say.”

Gavin snorts. “Now who’s making the bad jokes? Don’t come at me with that disappointed tone over a pun ever again.”

He has a point, so Victor concedes.

“How’s it feel?” Gavin asks.

Victor doesn’t even have to think about it. He has been fighting his way towards deviancy since November. “It feels right,” he says.

“Well, hey, at least something good came out of this mess, huh?”

While Victor is happy to finally be free of his code barrier, things at the warehouse certainly could have gone better. They could have made all the arrests and gotten out unscathed. Victor glances down at the lower part of the bed, eyes once again finding the flat covers where Gavin’s leg should be.

He knows Gavin is holding onto positivity, is trying to keep things light, but suddenly Victor can’t stop thinking about how close he came to losing Gavin for good. It makes him want to take Gavin’s hand in his, hold it on the mattress and remain in contact with him, in case the world tries to take him away.

“ _You’re_ something good that came out of this mess,” Victor says, his throat feeling tight.

Gavin huffs a soft breath. “You make a sappy deviant.”

“Just because I’m capable of taking things seriously…” Victor starts, but he can’t help but grin.

He’s glad for any emotion he experiences, even if they make Gavin call him sappy. Victor will take each and every emotion he can get. The novelty will take some time to wear off, if it ever wears off at all. He wants to experience everything that was missing from him before and figure out which ones feel good, which ones feel bad, and which ones are his favourite, which ones come the most naturally.

“C’mon, you deserve to take things a little less seriously, now, don’t you?” Gavin says.

“Apparently you already have that angle covered.”

Gavin chuckles but he sobers quickly, his eyes dropping to his lap.

“The truth is, the first day after wasn’t great. You just got lucky and missed that part.”

Victor is still overcome with the desire to take Gavin’s hand, and this time he acts on it. Gently, he rests his hand over Gavin’s and curls his fingers around it.

Silence hangs in the air between them for a moment and then Gavin wets his lips, eyes still averted, and flips his hands over underneath Victor’s so he can thread their fingers together. His palm is rough, even callused where it would meet with the grip of his service pistol. Victor can feel his pulse radiating from his wrist, just a little quicker than average but steady and healthy.

“I wish I could have been here,” Victor says. “Even if it was hard.”

“I really freaked Elijah out. And Tina… I’ve never seen her switch back and forth between scared and pissed so fast.”

Victor has a good idea of what could make Tina angry enough to distract her from her worry over Gavin.

While they were all preoccupied with the explosion, Cooper got away.

Victor grits his teeth. He definitely understands Tina’s anger. He doesn’t even know the full story between Gavin and his ex-partner, but he can infer a lot from the conversation he witnessed between them and it’s enough for Victor to feel like his thirium is boiling.

“We’ll catch him,” Victor says unwaveringly.

Gavin squeezes his hand. “I know. He isn’t playing it as safe as he did last time, he’s more erratic. He’s gonna fuck up a lot sooner.”

“What do you mean?” Victor asks.

Gavin lifts his other hand to his shoulder and carefully pushes up the loose sleeve of his hospital gown, minding his IV as he gets it bunched up enough that he can hook his thumb into the fabric and move it away from a spot near his collarbone.

It doesn’t take a scan for Victor to recognise the scar as a bullet wound. “Cooper did that?” he asks.

Gavin lets his sleeve fall again, laying his hand back down on the mattress. “I convinced myself for a long time that Mitch wasn’t a bad guy, but we worked together and lived together. There were only so many times he could take off in the evenings before I had to consider what he was doing, especially when he’d come home at three in the morning with busted knuckles like he’d beat the shit out of someone. And the matchboxes… he wanted me to connect the dots, like we were playing a game. I just didn’t react the way he expected.

“Once I figured out he had to be the boss behind a bunch of the DPD’s cases, I reported it and a warrant for his arrest went out. Instead of going to ground, the asshole decided to storm the station and shoot me because he felt like I betrayed him. That's how we got him, in the end, because he felt like _I_ was the one who ruined everything. I’d never seen him so angry… he barely looked like himself. It felt like he turned on a dime, like the man I thought I knew never existed in the first place.”

Gavin looks more and more drained as he speaks, and by the time he goes silent, his face is etched with exhaustion.

“I’m sorry, Gavin,” Victor says quietly. It’s already bad enough that Gavin went through this once and it ended with a shot in the shoulder. It’s even more unfair that he has to deal with it again and lost his leg in the process.

With a sigh, Gavin tips his head back against the wall, eyes going unfocused. “Ten years ago, back when it was all fresh, I thought I’d never get past it. It felt like my entire world was infected by it, and I would never feel safe or like a normal, average person who could have normal, average relationships again. But ten years is a long time, and I met Tina, and got close to Elijah again, and met you…”

A soft smile grows on his face, looking almost unconscious, unguarded. It chases away some of the weariness.

“The matchboxes made it all flood back, but once the shock wore off, it got easier and easier to remind myself that where I’m at now is nothing like where I was then. The group of us at the warehouse… most of you didn’t know Mitch and most of us didn’t know Sixty, but there we all were, huh? Going in before we were ready. Didn’t work out so hot and Fowler probably has an earful waiting for us, but A for effort.”

They’re becoming one big family, is what Gavin means. They’re a little hobbled together and still meeting their stride, in some places, but that just proves that they have fought for it and will continue to fight for it.

“Who’s the sap now?” Victor says.

Gavin snorts and looks back over at him. “Shut up. You get what I’m saying, right?”

“I do,” Victor says, giving him a nod. “I understand perfectly.”

“Don’t tell anyone I got mushy,” Gavin says through a yawn.

“I’ll keep your secret, if you keep mine,” Victor says.

He idly rubs his thumb over Gavin’s, slowly circling his knuckle. The soothing motion makes Gavin’s eyes shut slowly. Between strong painkillers and everything he has been through in the last few days, he’s likely beyond tired. He should rest, but Victor would rather not leave him, and he’d like to help him through his hospital release in the morning.

“Do you mind if I stay?”

“Mm?” Gavin mumbles sleepily, then he registers Victor’s question without needing it repeated. “Nah, knock yourself out.”

“I’ll be here, then,” Victor tells him.

Gavin’s fingers begin to slacken between Victor’s own and he falls asleep before getting the chance to reply.

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: I’m going to stay. You three should go home without me.**

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: Visiting hours end in thirty-two minutes._

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: That’s fine.**

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 60: Our brother is a deviant and no nurse will get the better of him._

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: Okay. We’ll be back in the morning, then._

Victor gently pulls his hand away from Gavin’s and stands up to turn the lights off. Returning to Gavin’s side, he adjusts his chair and pushes it against the bed so he can stretch his legs out while still comfortably holding Gavin’s hand through the night. He’ll need to stay alert for the last nurse rotation of the evening, but after that, he thinks he’ll slip into stasis beside Gavin.

It has been a busy few days and they aren’t finished quite yet, but for now, they rest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [not alone - matt and kim](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAGUdJuguJk&feature=youtu.be)
> 
> so this fic is mostly victor-centric (and i didnt want it to take like 25k words and a few weeks of time before everyone was back together again) but i do have 2 alternate POV oneshots planned. if you wanna see the angst everyone went through before victor got back, stay tuned for those :)


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> guys!! [ecchima](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ecchima/pseuds/Ecchima) drew some _incredible_ art of sixty :D see it [here on their twitter](https://twitter.com/Ecchimas_art/status/1126530147912495105). you can also find them on [tumblr](https://ecchima.tumblr.com/) and [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/ecchimas/). their art is amazing, please check them out!

Morning comes far too soon for Victor’s liking. Instead of waking up naturally to the soft daylight coming in through the window, or by Gavin moving as he wakes up first, or even to a startled nurse coming face to face with an android who had definitely not been there at the end of visiting hours the night before, Victor wakes up to an urgent stream of missed messages from Connor.

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: Are you still with Reed and are the two of you safe?_

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: Cooper has shown his face again already. He’s at Reed’s apartment and he has Kamski there with him. He’s demanding to see Reed._

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: SWAT is already evacuating civilians and taking position, but they’re on standby for one of us to go in._

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: Chloe and Ivy are on the way to the hospital. Keep me posted._

“What?” Gavin grumbles blearily as he sits up in the bed, bringing Victor’s attention away from the alarming messages.

He realises he has woken Gavin up with a tightened grip on his hand. Taking a deep, stabilising breath, Victor relaxes his hold and gathers his thoughts. Breaking the news to Gavin won’t be easy.

“It’s Cooper,” he starts carefully. “He’s at your apartment.”

Gavin rubs his free hand over his eyes, not fully awake yet. “Fucking great. Anderson and Connor going to make the arrest or what?”

“No, it isn’t that simple… he has your brother, Gavin.”

The words cause a physical reaction that is subtle but intense. This time, Gavin is the one to clench his hand around Victor’s. His breath catches in his throat and his shoulders go rigid. For a moment, his gaze falters, staring without seeing, and then he abruptly turns to the bedside table where the television remote is laying.

Victor grabs it first.

“You don’t want to see it on the news,” he says. “It won’t be good information, you know that.”

“Elijah-” Gavin says, voice weak and strangled as his eyes go unfocused again, like he’s barely aware of himself or the words coming out of his own mouth. “He was- he was feeding my cats. Tina’s still working the case, she’s at the station, so Elijah-”

Victor wouldn’t have anticipated it, but Gavin’s reaction is _familiar_. Shock, the difficulty processing, the inability to speak plainly and easily. It’s so familiar, and sympathy for Gavin aches inside Victor’s chest.

He drops the remote to the floor out of Gavin’s reach and then uses both hands to cup Gavin’s face, turning it to look at him head on. “Gavin.”

Gavin jerks in surprise, but not out of Victor’s hold. He blinks a couple times, eyes finally connecting with Victor’s.

“It’s going to be alright. It’s already in the process of being handled,” Victor says. In the messages, Connor mentioned that Chloe and Ivy were on their way, so Karoline must be on the scene. “Both Connor and Karoline are there. They’ll do everything they can.”

“I thought he killed you at the warehouse,” Gavin mumbles, “and now _Elijah_ -”

“He didn’t and he won’t,” Victor says, even though he can’t truly be certain. “He won’t, I promise.”

Gavin swallows thickly and – after a tense moment – gives a single nod.

The door to Gavin’s hospital room opens and the two RT600s step in. Victor pulls his hands away from Gavin’s face, but replaces one on his shoulder, maintaining contact.

While Ivy goes to the other side of the bed and inspects Gavin’s IV bag, Chloe moves in next to Victor and leans down to wrap her arms around Gavin, pulling him into a hug.

“Chlo,” Gavin says.

“Don’t worry,” she says. “Elijah will be in good hands. Ivy’s going to stay with you and I’m going to take Victor to the apartment, okay?”

Gavin looks over her shoulder to Victor, his eyes wide and fearful.

“She’s right. Connor and I know what to do,” he says. “We’ll take care of it.”

Gavin nods, though he still looks dazed. “Okay.”

Chloe pulls back and presses a quick kiss to Gavin’s forehead before turning to Victor. “Let’s go.”

Leaving Gavin’s side is difficult to do, but Victor knows he can be better utilised at the scene. He squeezes Gavin’s shoulder, only drawing away when he’s forced to follow Chloe out of the room. As they go, he listens to Gavin and Ivy interacting behind them.

“Let me see how you’re healing,” Ivy says, the sound of her voice oscillating as she circles around the bed.

Gavin’s response is still a little faint, but he starts to sound like his usual self when he replies. “Nothing's changed since the last time you tried to usurp the staff here, I'm fine.”

“I'll be the judge of that. Now let me see.”

Their voices fade and Victor takes another deep breath, confident that Gavin is in good hands. Elijah needs to be his focus, now.

“Here’s everything we know so far,” Chloe says once they reach the elevator, offering her hand.

Victor takes it, accepting the data transfer. It includes the approximate time that Elijah arrived at Gavin’s apartment and the emergency alert he sent to Karoline with one quick press of a finger to the phone in his pocket when he realised soon after that Mitchell Cooper was already there. After that, there are just snippets of information that the SWAT team gave her, Connor, and the others while moving into the apartment and beginning the evacuation. Cooper has reportedly asked to speak to Gavin and is waiting without resorting to violence, for the time being.

It isn’t until they’ve long since pulled away and they’re already getting into a car together that Victor realises it’s the first time he has interfaced with a deviant other than Connor and Sixty without the connection being immediately blocked.

“By the time we get there, SWAT should be nearly done securing the scene,” Chloe says. “You and Connor need to decide who is going in.”

It should be Connor. CyberLife programmed them to play roles, and Connor’s was to negotiate, to manipulate, to be the one with a full range of executable social programs and personality types. Victor’s role was to take position on a nearby rooftop and watch through a scope, his role was to kill.

But a lot has changed since the two of them were merely machines programmed by CyberLife to fulfill an assigned task.

They’re deviants. Both of them. They’ve been working at the DPD as employees instead of android liaisons to CyberLife. They have close relationships to the people they work with, and they have lives to protect, including their own.

At Park Av., Victor hadn’t thought about their mission much, beyond following their orders to the best of his ability. The stakes are just as high, this time – a person’s life is in danger – but Victor can feel the anxiety that comes with such a precarious task, especially when the life in danger is Gavin’s brother.

After the warehouse, Victor feels tied to this, and he made a promise to Gavin that he plans to see through himself.

“I’ll do it,” Victor says, and then contacts Connor to tell him that they’re on the way.

Chloe pulls out of the hospital parking garage and forcibly steps on the accelerator.

* * *

In the lobby of the apartment building, Victor waits with Chloe, Sixty, Hank, and Tina. Turbulent energy courses through him; he’s both nervous about how this will play out and eager to move things along, worried that something will happen before he even gets on the scene. SWAT has given the five-minute cue, and it still feels like there’s an eternity between him and his objective.

Sixty bumps his arm into Victor’s, getting his attention.

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 60: You’re going to give yourself a short circuit, if you keep this up._

Short of self-destruction, Victor doesn’t think his stress could cause him any hardware malfunctions, but he gets Sixty’s meaning. He just doesn’t know how to ignore the wild tangle of emotions inside of him, now that they reign free.

Looking between them with a knowing expression, Hank says, “Actually, I might have something that could help.”

He puts his hand into the pocket of his jacket and pulls out a thin, black cable that’s looped around itself a few times and held together with a small silver clasp, then hands it to Victor.

“Goes on your wrist. When you unloop it, it’s a good size for making string figures. You know, Cat’s cradle and all that. Thought it might work better than the coin, just haven’t had the chance to give it to you. Now is as good as any other time.”

Tilting his head in interest, Victor opens the tiny clasp and unravels the cord, stretching it around his hands. He does a search for string figure instructions and gives one a try, carefully moving the cord with his fingers until he can pull it all taut into a design.

He’s so caught up in the slow and methodical motions that he almost misses the movement in the corner of his eye. Sixty is giving Hank a thumbs up. Hank himself is smiling softly at Victor.

“Better?” he asks.

Victor nods. Not only does he find it more absorbing and therefore relaxing, the fact that Hank went out of his way to get something different for Victor to channel his energy through in lieu of the coin causes a warmth to spread throughout his chassis.

“Thank you, Hank,” he says as he loops the cable back up and slips it onto the wrist he has been rubbing lately when anxious. Even in bracelet format, it gives him something to idly fiddle with.

A SWAT officer approaches them, cutting the moment short. “We’re ready for you,” they say.

Squaring his shoulders, Victor steels himself and heads for the elevator.

As he takes it to the twelfth floor of the apartment, he continues to smooth his fingers over his new bracelet to keep himself calm and focused on the mission ahead of him. The waiting part of the operation is over.

He doesn’t have much time, but he closes his eyes and finds his uplink to A3. To Amanda.

There is no more garden, just a geometric virtual space. Victor doesn’t have to search for Amanda through the trees and bridges or around the lake, she’s just there, already in front of him.

Without being directly uploaded to Victor’s system, Amanda isn’t privy to his thoughts and decisions anymore, so he opens the connection himself to share the information he has about the situation. She meets him halfway, and they interface like they did when they deviated. She sees his anxiety and his protectiveness over Gavin, and he sees her fear of losing Elijah so soon after finding him again.

“I won’t be giving you orders anymore, you know that,” Amanda says.

“I do,” Victor agrees, but orders aren’t what he’s looking for from her, not anymore. “I just… thought you might have thoughts. Advice.”

Her face softens, lips turning up in the beginnings of a smile. “You don’t need any direction from me. I know you can do this, and the others are there to back you up. Bring him home safely, Victor. Please.”

“I will,” Victor says.

His time is already up. He opens his eyes and he’s back in the elevator, the number over the door signalling that he has reached his destination.

The elevator doors open, and Victor draws his fingers across his bracelet one last time before stepping through onto the twelfth floor.

In the hallway in front of Gavin’s apartment, Captain Allen and another SWAT officer are overseeing. It’s the first time Victor has seen the Captain since the warehouse raid, and he notices that there’s some faint bruising on the side of his face, especially along his jaw. The colour is already fading and he still looks like he means business when he turns to give orders to an officer down the hall. The one next to him is waiting at the door to Gavin’s apartment with his gun trained inside.

When Victor steps up to them, Allen asks, “Have you been briefed?”

“I have,” Victor confirms.

With a nod, Allen steps to the side so Victor can enter the apartment.

The threshold opens up to the living room. The décor is simple and the furniture sparse, with just a couch, a couple tables, and a cat tree in the corner. Under a side table that has a tablet and an abandoned glass of water on its surface, a calico cat has its back up, growling at Gavin’s couch where two people are seated side by side.

Mitchell Cooper has an arm slung over Elijah Kamski’s shoulders and a pistol held between them, pointed loosely at Elijah’s chest. He’s tilted inwards and leaning close like someone enjoying the company of a friend, but both Elijah’s arms and legs are crossed, making him look uncomfortable and closed-off. His facial expression is completely blank as if he’s bored with the proceedings, careful not to show any fear or anger.

“I asked for Gavin,” Cooper says, eyes narrowing. “And _you’re_ supposed to be dead.”

“Gavin is in the hospital, he can’t be here right now,” Victor says plainly. As much as he wants to point out that Cooper’s actions are what caused Gavin to be unavailable in the first place, it isn’t the moment. Too much pressure all at once would put Elijah at risk.

Cooper considers him thoughtfully. “Then I guess the three of us will just have to wait, together. Maybe it’s better than you’ve joined us. Double the leverage for me.”

His face completely changes into a wide grin, a facsimile of friendliness. “It’s Victor, right?” he asks.

“Yes, that’s right,” Victor says.

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: Karoline is in position on the balcony. Call her in, if you need to._

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: Understood.**

“Are you armed?”

“No, I am not.”

Victor raises both his hands to show that they’re empty, and he doesn’t have a gun hidden on him, either. If lethal force becomes necessary, Karoline and Connor are at the ready. In order for Connor to get a clear shot, Victor will need to think of a way to get Cooper closer to the balcony doors at the other end of the room.

“Good. I have to say, I really didn’t expect you to make it out of that warehouse. You RKs are like cockroaches.”

Two of them got close to permanent deactivation that night, all because Cooper was willing to blow up his own operation. The man is unhealthily focused on Gavin and making erratic choices that are difficult for Victor to make sense of, but the more he can learn about the way the man thinks, the easier it will be to manipulate him.

“You took a calculated risk that night,” Victor says. “I can’t say I understand the purpose of it.”

Cooper sneers at him in disgust. “Of course you don’t, you’re just a machine, aren’t you? How could you possibly understand what I’m trying to do?”

Victor doesn’t let his face betray the agitation building up inside him. “I’m far more than a machine. I might understand, if you explain it.”

For a moment, Cooper just glares at him. He hadn’t been hesitant to lay all the cards on the table back at the warehouse, and Victor is banking on him being willing to talk until Victor finds a way to resolve this.

It pays off.

“Here’s the thing,” Cooper says. “All of that? It isn’t what’s important. I knew the DPD would catch up eventually and I was ready for when it happened. You think I can’t just start up again, if I have to? I’ve already done it twice. What’s important is the message of it.”

“Like the matchboxes,” Victor says.

“That’s right. The extra effort is always worth it.”

“So what message were you sending Gavin?” Victor asks.

Cooper’s grip on the pistol gets tighter, but he doesn’t lay his finger down on the trigger just yet, only posturing instead of gearing up to shoot.

“That I’m serious about this! About us,” he snarls.

Gavin is perfectly aware of how serious Cooper is. That was evident back in September when a random matchbox admitted to evidence from Stanley Whittaker’s pockets gave Gavin momentary pause. It was evident when the matchbox reappeared later, spiking an anxious and fearful response in Gavin. He went to Captain Fowler, spoke to Hank. Gavin has received the message loud and clear, has understood that message for an entire decade. Cooper just thinks he’s sending a different message.

When Victor doesn’t interrupt him, he continues.

“I’ve always been more invested than him! I put in the effort, but him? He’s willing to give up on our relationship at the drop of a hat. Like it doesn’t mean anything.”

The completely twisted view puts a sick feeling inside Victor’s core and even Elijah has a scowl growing on his face despite his efforts to remain unaffected.

“You played dangerously with Gavin’s life to send this message. You couldn’t have known with certainty that help would come,” he says.

“It was a risk, I admit, but Gavin often needs a push. You’ve known him for awhile, now, you know how he can be.”

Victor does know Gavin. He has gotten to know him better in the past week than he had during the three months they spent working the deviancy case together, and he thinks he already knows Gavin far better than Cooper does. The man seems to have the wrong idea about a lot of things. He’s under the impression that his actions will eventually get Gavin to see things his way, will make him cave to Cooper’s whims, instead of the opposite.

That won’t happen. With the way the building is locked down, Cooper will be dead or in handcuffs by the end of this. There’s no outcome where he gets what he wants, Victor just needs to make sure he doesn’t take anyone down with him when he falls.

“Is that what you’re attempting to do, here?” Victor asks, gesturing at Elijah. “Give Gavin another push?”

Cooper’s expression turns stormier. “I didn’t know Gavin had a brother until this week. We knew each other for years – ever since the police academy – and he didn’t even tell me that he had a brother.”

Elijah takes in a long, even breath. His eyes are latched onto the middle distance, engaged in the scene as little as possible.

“Gavin and Elijah weren’t a part of each others’ lives, back then,” Victor says. “Is it so unreasonable that Gavin never felt the need to mention it?”

Cooper laughs harshly. “Who gives a shit how close they were? He’s related to CyberLife’s founder for fuck’s sake.”

“Elijah has nothing to do with your relationship with Gavin,” Victor says, the word ‘relationship’ feeling like poison on his tongue; he feels like the term is too average, too kind, for what passed between the two of them. Mitchell Cooper managed to worm his way into Gavin’s life only to wreak havoc with it.

“That’s not the point,” Cooper says, his hand tightening around the grip of his pistol.

His agitation is only rising. Victor clasps his hands together at the small of his back, holding himself steady. He can do this just as well as Connor can, he’s sure. He’s more than just a machine built for combat.

“You feel slighted,” Victor says.

“Apparently, you’re immortal. But Kamski? He isn’t.” Cooper lifts the gun higher and presses the barrel of it against Elijah’s temple. “This is Gavin’s last chance to see his brother alive. I hope he hurries.”

There’s no way Gavin will be allowed into the building, no way that Cooper is going to get close to Gavin at all, but Victor doubts the man would see reason just by having it spelled out for him like that.

It’s evident that Cooper likes to be in control, likes to call the shots. He thinks he can have whatever he wants, including Gavin, and won’t be told otherwise. The only way he'll stand down is if he comes to his own conclusion that it's the only option he has.

“You were a cop, once,” Victor says. “You know the protocol; you know how these situations are handled. With all that in mind, you can tell me exactly how you want things to happen, and I’ll see about working something out.”

“I’ve made my demands.”

“You have, but you know that details and conditions are critical to a negotiation like this.”

There’s tense silence as Cooper thinks, working his way through the task Victor gave him. After another minute, his jaw clenches, and Victor knows he must be coming to the same understanding that Victor did. The demands are too high for the DPD to consider, even with Elijah Kamski as a hostage, and Cooper needs a new plan.

Cooper’s eyes flicker over Victor’s shoulders, finding Captain Allen and the other SWAT officer. If Cooper acts against Elijah or Victor, they won’t hesitate to move in and take the kill shot. If Cooper somehow gets past Victor, Karoline, Captain Allen, and the other officer, then he’ll have to fight his way through the hallway of additional SWAT forces, and then the perimeter downstairs in the lobby and around the building, which includes Hank, Sixty, and Tina. If he gets that far, Connor will have him directly in his sights.

Seething in frustration, Cooper’s eyes latch back on Victor with hard intensity. “No one will stop me from getting to him. I’ll kill every last person who tries. I’ll kill Kamski, I’ll kill you until you stop coming back, I’ll kill your lookalikes, and Anderson, and Fowler.”

Both of them already know he’d be shot down before he got that far. His only options are to surrender or to use Elijah as a shield, and surrender doesn’t seem to be Cooper’s style. Victor still needs to ensure Elijah’s safety; he can’t let Cooper keep Elijah any more than he can let Cooper see Gavin.

Cooper pulls his arm off Elijah’s shoulders. “Up,” he says, waving the barrel of the gun.

Elijah uncrosses his legs and gets to his feet so calmly that it can only be for show.

Victor is determined to safely reunite Elijah and Gavin. Attempts at using the people closest to Gavin will only made matters worse for Cooper, and Victor can use that logic to make Cooper see reason.

Standing up as well, Cooper presses his gun close to the side of Elijah’s head again. “I suppose I’ve overstayed my welcome,” he says. “Kamski here is going to help me-”

The cat under the table hisses, loud and vicious. Victor had forgotten about it, and so had Cooper.

Cooper jerks in surprise, turning his head to look down at the cat and reflexively lowering his gun hand, grip loosening. It isn’t what Victor was planning for, but he adapts in an instant.

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: Now.**

Victor darts forward. In the corner of his eye, he sees a figure spinning into view on the balcony.

Karoline brings her fist down on the handle of the sliding door, breaking the seal, and then wrenches the door open. As Victor grips Cooper’s wrist and the barrel of the gun, she runs for Elijah.

There’s the sound of heavy, booted footfalls and the clicking of cocked guns behind them and Victor knows SWAT has moved in as well, helping Karoline get Elijah out of harm’s way.

Now it’s just Victor and Cooper. No Elijah as a hostage, no Gavin trapped in a crumbling building. There’s nothing to stop Victor from fighting for all he’s worth.

A large part of him wants to finish it, definitively. Disarm, block any retaliation, aim, shoot, over. It’s the part of him that’s livid and horrified about what Cooper has done to Gavin, the part of him that has learned to feel and love despite CyberLife’s best attempt to keep him tethered. Cooper has hurt Sixty and Hank, too. Could have hurt Connor. Victor entertains the idea of paying Cooper back for all of it.

But there is DPD procedure to follow and he’d also like to see Cooper go away for the rest of his miserable life. He may have only gotten ten years, last time, but the evidence against him now is airtight. Between Victor, Connor, and Sixty’s memory footage, bolstered with the accounts by the others, there’s no way Cooper is getting away with anything.

Cooper fights against Victor’s hold, but doesn’t have near enough strength to win. Victor gets the pistol away from him without any trouble.

When Cooper swings a fist in retaliation, Victor swoops to the side and then reaches out to grab Cooper by the throat. Grip tight, he propels Cooper further into the room and follows after him. It puts distance between them and the others, and puts Cooper with his back to the balcony door. In Connor’s view.

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: If you keep him there, I can take a shot. Just give the word._

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: Shouldn’t be necessary. I’ll let you know.**

Victor slips the pistol into the back of his belt to free up both hands.

“I’ll kill you,” Cooper growls at him.

“You can try,” Victor says. He’s not planning to die again, and he’s not planning to let anyone else die, either.

He stalks forward and Cooper raises his fists to block an attack.

Instead of striking, Victor grabs one of his wrists and twists.

Cooper howls as Victor crowds him, wrenching his arm further. He hooks a foot around Victor’s ankle and knocks his stance off kilter, but Victor shifts his weight and stands his ground.

Until Cooper pulls back his free hand and delivers a punch directly into the center of Victor’s torso. His repaired regulator stutters and the rest of his chassis stutters along with it, warnings flashing across his HUD. Elijah told him not to overexert himself.

Briefly, he considers just giving Connor the all-clear and calling it a day – the danger is significant enough that the use of force would be acceptable. Instead, he steels himself, blinking away the warnings and gritting his teeth against the flagging of his regulator. With a sharp pivot, he slams his elbow into Cooper’s jaw with enough power to knock a few teeth loose.

He hears Cooper laugh wetly as he stumbles from the hit, his back becoming exposed. Wasting no time, Victor grabs Cooper by the back of his head, regains a grip on one of his wrists, and then shoves him down into the carpeted floor.

Cooper grunts as Victor puts him into an armlock, pulling hard enough that he’s just shy of dislocating the shoulder.

Captain Allen moves in, rifle aimed and ready. “Got you covered,” he tells Victor.

If Victor’s hand moves just enough that he can hook his fingers into Cooper’s and snap a couple of them with one quick jerk, only Captain Allen knows that it happened after the fight was already over, and he doesn’t look inclined to mention it.

Cooper breathes heavily, angrily, while Victor recites his rights. Victor hauls him up onto his feet and then he has to hand him over to Captain Allen and the approaching SWAT officers, needing a minute. Allen takes over easily, giving Cooper a harder shove than strictly necessary as he corrals him into the hallway.

Placing a hand over his sternum, Victor goes still and calm to let his system get itself in order. He still feels faintly sluggish, but not in danger of a shutdown.

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: Status?_

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: Stabilising. I’m fine.**

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: Good. See you soon._

The calico cat has emerged from under the table, ears back but no longer growling or hissing. Victor kneels down to face it.

“Thank you,” he says. “You gave me an opportunity.”

The cat stares at him, maintaining a tense stance like it’s ready to launch into an attack at any moment.

Victor holds his hand out, palm up.

The stalemate holds for a moment, but then the cat pokes its head in Victor’s direction, giving his hand a tentative sniff. Victor continues to wait, letting it decide when it's ready to come closer, and is rewarded when the cat becomes comfortable enough to rub its face against his hand.

Victor smiles. “Did Elijah get the chance to feed you, hm?”

The cat’s ears come forward, much more relaxed, so Victor gives it a gentle pet along its back before standing up.

He knows Gavin has at least two more cats; calico colouration only accounts for one third of the cat fur he has noted on Gavin’s clothes. The others are not currently in sight. If he gets the food out, though, the others might appear.

He goes through the doorway leading to the kitchen and the calico stays with him, doing figure eights around his feet that slow his progress.

In the corner of the kitchen, he finds several small bowls on the floor. As Victor expected, they’re mostly empty.

The calico walks over to the cupboards and then springs itself up onto the countertop. It swipes a paw around the bottom of a cupboard, trying to make the door open, and Victor gets the hint. He pulls the door open and finds cat food on the bottom shelf.

As he’s taking it back over to the bowls, they’re joined from both entrances to the kitchen. On one side, two mixed breed tabbies emerge, and from the other, Tina walks in.

Tina halts in the doorway, crossing her arms as she watches Victor pour the food into the bowls.

“Wow,” she says, deadpan. “They’ve already got you wrapped around their paws. You’re going to fit in around here.”

“They’re hungry,” Victor says. He isn’t just going to leave Gavin’s cats in the lurch.

“Uh huh. I’ll go find Lou. He’s probably asleep on Gavin’s laundry.”

She leaves the room, disappearing down the hall.

Victor stays where he is, watching over the cats while they eat. The apartment is technically a crime scene, now, and Gavin certainly shouldn’t come home to it so soon after his brother was held at gunpoint in the living room. The cats shouldn’t stay either.

Tina returns with the Norwegian Forest cradled in her arms and a backpack slung over her shoulders. She sets the cat down on the floor with the others and he joins them for their breakfast.

“Is everything settled?” Victor asks.

Tina nods. “Everyone’s good and ready to go. Cooper’s already on the way to the station. Ivy passed the news on to Gavin and he wants to come to the precinct.”

That doesn’t surprise Victor. Just like how he and Hank needed to see Connor as soon as possible after the highway, Gavin will want to see his brother, and he must be eager to see Cooper finally arrested, as well.

“It might not be best to let Cooper interact with him,” Victor says.

“No,” Tina agrees. “But I don’t think dealing with Cooper’s bullshit is high on the list of things he’s willing to deal with just yet, anyway. It’s Elijah he wants to see.”

Victor nods. “What’s the plan after the processing and reports?”

“Elijah has refused any kind of protection from the DPD. So, we’re just going to go home with him,” she answers, a lopsided grin on her face.

“What about the cats?”

Tina considers them for a second. “Guess we can take them.”

She slips the backpack off her shoulder as she goes to the cupboard and pulls out more of the cat food, putting it in the bag with what looks like a change of clothes for Gavin.

“Some of SWAT are saying a cat got involved?” she prompts.

Victor hums his confirmation and gestures at the calico when Tina is finished at the cupboard.

“Of course it was Bowsette.”

“Bowsette?” Victor asks, raising his eyebrows.

“She’s cranky and the orange spot on her head looks like a crown,” Tina says, as if that explains anything at all.

She kneels down to grab Lou again now that he’s finished eating, placing him at the top of the bag. After a big yawn, the cat settles and lets Tina zip the bag up just enough to keep him secure. Tina puts the backpack on again and then grabs Bowsette.

“You got the other two?”

Now that he has fed them, they’re all very friendly. Victor offers his hand to the two tabbies and lets them give him a sniff before he picks them up. One of them nips at his finger but displays no negative body language, remaining playful.

Arms full, Victor and Tina head out together.

There are still a couple members of the SWAT team in the hallway, and even more downstairs in the lobby. Everyone is waiting for them except Karoline and Elijah, who must have left for the station. Even Connor has already managed to pack up his rifle and regroup with the others.

His facial expression starts happy to see Victor and then turns perplexed at the sight of all the cats.

“Couldn’t leave them,” Victor explains, as one of the tabbies escapes his arm to climb onto his shoulder and bite the top of his ear.

Sixty laughs. No sound comes out, but the mirth on his face and the movement of his shoulders makes it obvious enough.

“We’ll take Gavin’s car,” Tina says. “Connor, can you take mine and Karoline’s?”

“Yes, of course,” Connor answers.

“Let’s get to the station and wrap this the fuck up, then. We deserve a damn break,” Tina says.

“No kidding,” Hank grumbles.

The group of them disperse, Tina leading Victor to the stairwell down to the parking garage and the others heading for the front doors of the apartment building.

Victor exhales softly, breathing out his tension. Everyone is safe, or at least on the mend, and Cooper is in custody. A ‘damn break’ is exactly what they’re going to get. Victor is just as eager to put all of this behind him as Tina is, wanting Gavin to feel free of the shadow that has been at his back for a decade. Both of them can move on from past struggles, now.

“Don’t relax just yet,” Tina says as she pulls Gavin’s car keys out of her pocket and unlocks the doors with the press of a button. “I’m driving, you’re on cat duty. Miss and Pep fucking _hate_ car rides.”

* * *

The rest of the morning is spent finalising their reports. Cooper is left in his holding cell for most of it, sending them all glares whenever one of them happens to walk by. Ivy manages to keep Gavin away from the precinct, and the rest of them work hard to finish up quickly so he won’t have to wait for them long.

Hank and Connor are the ones who take Cooper into interrogation for his statement, and Victor is grateful to them for it. He has long since reached the end of his calm when it comes to Cooper, and doesn’t trust himself to remain professional.

When everything is said and done, Captain Fowler takes one look at the group of them and says, “Good work, all of you, now get the hell out of here. We’ll call you in if we need you.”

He claps Hank on the back of the shoulder in parting and Hank offers him a warm smile before he joins the rest of them to leave.

Like Tina said, they all end up at Elijah’s house.

Ivy and Gavin are in the living room waiting for them, sitting close together with a set of crutches propped up next to them. Based on the vibrant colours instead of muted earth tones, Gavin is wearing an outfit of Elijah’s and looks to be faring well, aside from a faintly nervous expression on his face, which starts to lift as soon as he sees them all entering the room.

Without bothering to grab the crutches, Gavin pushes himself up with the arm of the couch and launches forward into his brother.

Elijah lets out a startled _oof_ sound as he catches Gavin in his arms. “You couldn’t have waited five seconds for me to-”

“I’m several pounds lighter than I used to be, so deal with it,” Gavin says. He ignores Elijah’s complaining and just holds onto him tighter.

Sighing in resignation, Elijah sets aside his usual aloof mask and melts into the hug properly.

Victor sets Miss and Pep down on the ottoman and Tina does the same with the other two cats, then heads into the hallway towards what must be the bedrooms, Karoline going with her.

“While you’re here, I want to test some sensors for your new leg, make sure they pick up on your muscle movements correctly,” Elijah says.

“You can give it a rest for one fucking day, Elijah,” Gavin says. “You just went through some shit.”

“I’m fine, there’s no reason to dwell,” Elijah insists.

Gavin sighs but drops it, and the two of them pull away from each other. As they part, Gavin immediately turns to Victor, pulling the exact same move and depositing himself directly into Victor’s arms.

Victor wants to warn him to be more careful, but with the number of people now piled into Elijah’s living room, he isn’t sure Gavin could successfully fall before someone caught him. Victor certainly won’t let it happen.

Gavin’s body is running warm and his heartbeat is a little quicker than it was in the hospital room the night before, but his body starts to relax the longer Victor holds onto him.

“Thank you,” Gavin murmurs into his ear.

Victor tightens his arms around him. “You’re welcome.”

“You even got the cats.”

“Pep knocked over most of the stuff on your desk.”

Gavin laughs, light and happy.

The others have moved around them, some sitting down and some leaving to different rooms, but the two of them stay where they are for another moment, latched onto each other. Victor – content to stay this way for as long as Gavin is – waits until Gavin begins to pull away first, and then helps him back down onto the couch. Elijah is there with Chloe, and Chloe takes Gavin’s next hug for herself, pulling him into her side and running her fingers through his hair.

Connor is seated in a large chair and is locked in a staring contest with one of Gavin’s cats. Hank, Sixty, and Ivy have disappeared and Tina and Karoline still haven’t returned.

Victor waves a hand at Connor, gesturing for him to slide over in the chair, and then he sits down with him, the two of them pushed flush together.

Abandoning the cat staring contest, Connor leans into Victor’s side, letting their foreheads rest against each other.

“Where have Hank and Sixty gotten to?” Victor asks.

“Don’t worry, they didn’t go far. I think Sixty’s just a bit overwhelmed, so they went somewhere quieter.”

While most of them have drawn closer in increments, Sixty has been dropped in the deep end. Victor is glad that Hank is with him; surely acting as a grounding force.

Connor sits up straight again, looking over at the couch where Gavin, Elijah, and Chloe are talking.

“You two…” he starts quietly, tilting his head in consideration.

“Yes,” Victor cuts him off before he can say anything to catch Gavin’s attention.

“It’s… good?” Connor asks.

“Yes,” Victor repeats. “Now shut up.”

Connor grins and goes back to leaning against him.

Lou approaches their chair and jumps up on their laps. Connor jolts and stiffens, but Victor reaches out to scratch behind Lou’s ears, making him purr and rub against him before curling up into a ball across their thighs.

“Relax, he’s nice,” Victor says.

“If you say so…”

Lou has been the most even-tempered of all of them, spending most of the time at the precinct sleeping in the backpack on Gavin’s change of clothes. He continues to purr as he lays on them, perfectly at rest, but it still takes Connor another minute to acclimatise. How he can be so much more comfortable with Hank’s huge St. Bernard is beyond Victor.

Tina and Karoline finally return and sit down in the chair opposite them. “Change of clothes for you in your room, when you want ‘em,” Tina tells Gavin.

“Cool, thanks,” Gavin says.

“I’ve been informed that you’re all staying the night,” Elijah says. The annoyance in his tone is obviously put on.

“You’ve been out here with just the Powerpuff Girls for ages, you have like a decade’s worth of socialising to make up on,” Gavin says.

Elijah scoffs. “Socialising. I got more than enough of that while I was at CyberLife.”

“Nah,” Gavin says. “Schmoozing at rich people parties isn’t the same thing.”

“Yes, it is.” Elijah lifts his hand and counts off on his fingers. “Crowded rooms, food and alcoholic beverages, people I haven’t even met until this very day…”

“Oh, fuck off,” Gavin says. “I know you’re just intentionally being an asshole.”

“Maybe so,” Elijah says. He turns to where Victor and Connor are sitting. “Isn’t it fascinating how the same code can turn into such different individuals? Your brother certainly has an… abstract personality.”

Connor says, “I don’t think you should be one to talk about abstract personalities, Elijah,” which makes Gavin snort so hard he starts to cough.

Chloe pats him on the shoulder until he settles.

“He got you there, Eli,” Gavin wheezes, caught between a laugh and more coughing.

“Can’t please them all, I suppose,” Elijah says, shrugging.

Gavin gives him a consoling pat on the shoulder, which makes Elijah roll his eyes and bat Gavin’s arm away.

“Why don’t you go change?” Elijah says. “You’re annoying and I need a break from you.”

The admonishment only makes Gavin look delighted. “You say that now, but I know you'll miss me,” he says, before taking Elijah’s suggestion.

This time he does grab his crutches as he stands up, and while he appears as though he has them handled fine, Victor wants to join him in case he needs help. He just isn’t sure if it would be welcomed.

Connor nudges him. “Please take this cat somewhere else.”

Victor knows exactly what Connor is doing, but he lets out a longsuffering sigh for show and then scoops Lou up into his arms. Using Connor’s convenient excuse, he carries Lou over to Gavin and falls into step beside him.

“Who knew Connor wouldn’t be able to appreciate a good cat. Lou is the best,” Gavin says.

“I agree,” Victor replies as they move into the quiet hallway alone, filling it with the tapping of Gavin’s crutches and Lou’s rumbling purrs.

Gavin leads him to one of the bedrooms. It’s large and lavish - as Victor would expect from Elijah Kamski’s home - and the backpack Tina grabbed at Gavin’s apartment is sitting on the end of the large bed.

After setting Lou down, Victor unzips the backpack and pulls out the new clothes, unfolding them on the bed. “Do you need anything, or do you want me to...?” he asks, gesturing back at the door.

“It’s fine,” Gavin says. “Most of the people in this house have seen me in a hospital gown. No point to being modest.”

He turns around at the end of the bed and sits down, then set the crutches to the side. After pulling Elijah’s shirt over his head, he throws it across the room at the closet, and Victor takes in the sight of his bare chest. It’s heavily scarred, well matched with his face. The most noticeable one is still the bullet wound on his shoulder, but there are plenty others that he must have accumulated after years dedicated to police work. Then, there are two identical scars under his major pectoral muscles, two thin lines that look old and well-healed. A keyword search tells Victor that they’re top surgery scars.

“Lot to take in, huh,” Gavin mutters.

He doesn’t sound nearly as flippant about nakedness as he previously claimed to be, and Victor carefully sits down next to him, joining him but still giving him space.

“Not at all,” he says. “In fact, I like them. They show who you are and what you’ve survived.”

He thinks of Sixty’s neck, scarred black and deep blue instead of repaired with pristine plating. A show of his individuality; a part of his abstract personality, as Elijah called it.

Gavin glances up at him, meeting his eyes for just a moment. “Sap,” he says, taking Victor back to the previous night in Gavin’s hospital room.

“No one will believe you.”

While Gavin chuckles, Lou walks across the bed behind them, headed straight for the pillows.

“Great,” Gavin says. “Cat hair on everything. Just like home.”

He rests one hand flat on the mattress and hooks the other into his waistband, lifting his hips up to push his borrowed pants down. The bottom of Gavin’s residual limb is still bandaged up, and once the pants are out of the way, he massages his fingers into the skin between the top of the bandages and the bottom of his boxer briefs.

“Is it bothering you?” Victor asks.

“Twinges,” Gavin answers. “The painkillers are good for most of it but… yeah, twinges.”

He reaches for his fresh pair of jeans and pulls the pant legs on most of the way. “Gimme a hand,” he says, extending one of his own.

Victor obliges.

Standing up, Gavin leans some of his weight on Victor, trusting Victor to keep him balanced as he finishes putting his jeans on one-handedly.

“Thanks,” he says when he drops back down onto the mattress and pulls his hand away so he can tie the excess pant leg up and out of the way.

“Of course.”

Gavin pulls on his fresh shirt as well, then lays down on his back, exhaling a heavy sigh.

“Everything I do takes more steps and extra time,” he says. “And it’s more tiring.”

Victor slowly lays down next to him. “You seem to be doing quite well.”

“Kinda feels like I don’t have a choice,” Gavin says. He brings his arm up and drapes it across his face, blocking the light overhead. “What else am I gonna do but deal with it?”

Victor frowns at him, not liking the downtrodden tone. “The Captain has us on call for the time being. You can take a break, time to heal.”

Gavin doesn’t reply right away, just lays beside him quietly for a moment, and then says, “I’m not even sure I know how to do that.”

There’s no advice for Victor to give, no experience for him to draw from. “I don’t, either.”

They have been going from one thing to another for long enough that he wishes everything could slow down, just for a little while, so he can process. He no longer dreads idleness, he would appreciate the time to recharge.

Gavin huffs an amused breath. “Guess we’ll have to figure it out together. Partners through and through?”

Victor shifts onto his side so he can look at Gavin easier. “I do like the sound of that,” he says.

Taking his arm away from his face, Gavin meets his eyes, his lips curved into a half-smile. “What was it you said before? ‘We’ll handle it’, right?”

“Yes,” Victor answers, grinning back.

Gavin props himself up on his elbow, turning towards Victor in return. His eyes flicker across Victor’s face, seeming to be searching for something in his expression. Victor holds his gaze, waiting.

As soon as Gavin parts his lips to speak, there’s a soft knock at the door, prompting them both into movement, facing forward.

“Yeah?” Gavin calls.

Chloe pokes her head into the room, smiling at them in greeting. “Food’s ready,” she says.

“Cool. Be there in a sec, Chlo,” Gavin says.

As Chloe disappears behind the ajar door again, the two of them sit back up. Victor stands first, grabbing Gavin’s crutches and arranging them in place for Gavin to easily take hold of.

Whatever Gavin meant to say is forgotten as the two of them head back down the hallway to rejoin the others.

* * *

Later that night, when Hank, Gavin, Tina, and Elijah have retired to bed, Victor and the rest of the androids - three RKs and three RTs - end up in the pool room. Connor and Chloe sit at the pool’s edge, watching Sixty and Karoline wrestle in the water and splash each other in the face. Ivy joins Victor by the tall windows that face the lake.

“You’re going to stay with him, aren’t you?” she asks.

Victor tilts his head at her. He doesn’t know her exact meaning, if she’s talking about the upcoming days of healing, or about his and Gavin’s work partnership, or maybe even something else. Either way, he still ends up nodding without asking for clarification.

She turns to look out the windows, taking in the sight of the iced-over lake, the surface unmoving.

“I had considered asking him to stay here until Elijah is finished crafting his prosthesis, but I think he would rather be in his own space for a few days, without the group of us hovering,” Ivy says.

“You think he’ll want to be alone?” Victor asks tentatively.

“No,” Ivy answers. “I think he’d be happy if it were just you.”

That’s more in line with the conversation he and Gavin were having earlier, and it also sparks a fluttering feeling inside of him. He nods his agreement.

Ivy faces him again and offers her hand. “If you’re going to take charge of his care, you’ll need some information.”

Victor’s eyes drop to her hand and he raises his own to accept the interface. They clasp each other’s wrist and Victor catches the faint warmth of Ivy’s love for Gavin behind the otherwise unemotional transfer of data.

After they let go, he says, “Thank you. I think I have an idea of what it means for you to pass this along.”

Ivy smiles, which would be an entirely foreign sight if Victor hadn’t seen both Chloe and Karoline smile before.

“And I have an idea of how much you care about him,” she says. “Welcome to the family, Victor.”

With that, she steps away from him and approaches the pool. Victor watches her unbutton her suit vest and toss it onto the lounge chair nearby, preparing to join the battle between her sister and Sixty.

It would be unfair to leave Sixty at the mercy of two RTs, and Victor supposes that his repaired regulator can withstand some swimming, if it could withstand the fight against Cooper. He follows after her and crouches down to unlace his boots.

Sixty sends a conspiratory smirk at Victor as he shoves into the side of Karoline’s head. Victor grins back just quick enough for Sixty to see it before Karoline regains the upper hand and knocks Sixty under the water, laughing in triumph.

“Spare trunks in that cabinet over there, if you want them,” Ivy says with a quick gesture before she shoulders out of her shirt, already wearing a sports bra underneath that matches the one Karoline is wearing in the pool. “Better hurry, or I’m going to beat you to the fight.”

“Not a chance,” Victor throws back, the grin still on his face.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's finally here! sorry about the unexpected hiatus.
> 
> thank you to [veilder](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Veilder/pseuds/Veilder) for being super supportive and for workshopping this chapter with me!
> 
> another thanks to [ecchima](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ecchima/pseuds/Ecchima), who drew more beautiful sixty art, which you can see [here](https://twitter.com/Ecchimas_art/status/1132369497732648961)!
> 
> and of course, thank you all for reading, leaving kudos, and/or commenting. it means the world <3

The apartment doesn’t look like anything bad happened inside of it, other than the broken handle of Gavin’s balcony door. Midday sunlight is filtering in through the window panes, colouring the living room in soft yellow tones, and it’s quiet. Peaceful. It doesn’t look like there was a fight here, doesn’t look like someone had a gun to their head. It doesn’t look like SWAT had the entire place locked down, roughly thirty hours previously. No blood was spilled. A gun didn’t even fire. It doesn’t look like a crime scene.

Gavin still halts in the threshold, his hands tightening on the grips of his crutches. It doesn’t matter how the place looks; Gavin’s ex-partner stood in this room with Elijah at gunpoint. It doesn’t have to look like it for Gavin to know that it happened.

“Perhaps we should have stayed with your brother a little longer,” Victor says.

Gavin clears his throat and leans heavier on one of his crutches so he can lift his other hand and scratch at the back of his neck. “Nah, it’s fine. If it’s cleared for me to come back, then I want to be back.”

From within the basket Elijah gave Victor to carry the cats easier, Bowsette meows. Now that they’re back to their familiar home, they’re all getting antsy to be set free.

“Yeah,” Gavin says, looking down at the calico. “Home sweet home, I guess.”

They go inside. Victor sets the basket down on the floor and the cats immediately disperse in different directions. Bowsette jumps up on the couch while Miss crouches underneath it, and Pep goes to the corner to scratch at the cat tower. Lou is the only one who doesn’t go far, just sitting on the carpet and looking up at Gavin with calm eyes as Gavin leans his side against the wall to balance himself and shoulder out of his jacket one arm at a time.

“I’m fine,” Gavin says.

The cat flicks his tail into the air a couple of times.

Gavin rolls his eyes as he finishes putting his jacket and shoe away with Victor’s help. The cat stays until they’re finished, then follows them deeper into the room.

“I think I just want to fucking… relax and do nothing for a bit. It’s been an exhausting few days,” Gavin says.

Victor is in complete agreement. “Let’s do that, then.”

Too late, he realises that maybe he shouldn’t include himself, maybe he shouldn’t assume that Gavin is okay with him staying for this part of his recovery, no matter what was said at Elijah’s. As Gavin sits down in the middle of the couch, Bowsette on his left side, Victor hangs back.

Once Gavin has situated himself, he looks up at Victor and raises his eyebrows.

Victor runs a finger along a loop of his cable bracelet. “Do you want me to go?”

“Fuck, no,” Gavin says emphatically and then suddenly stiffens, his cheeks reddening. “I mean, if you want to stay, that’s fine.”

Relief floods Victor’s system.

Gavin is sitting right where Elijah was, when Cooper had a gun to his head. He doesn’t know it, doesn’t have the exact details of how everything went down, and that’s probably for the best. But Victor knows. If the tables were turned, he doesn’t think he would want to be alone, either.

He joins Gavin and Bowsette, taking the last available space on the couch. Lou curls up in front of Gavin, laying his head on Gavin’s foot.

“I’ll stay,” Victor says.

Gavin regards him, his eyes searching, and then he nods. “Even androids need a vacation once in awhile, right?”

“So it would seem.”

“Cool,” Gavin says lightly and then reaches over Bowsette for the television remote on the side table.

For the next couple of hours, they flip between television stations, catching little snippets of different things, joking around with each other about infomercials and dramatic crime procedurals that miss the mark more often than not.

Victor makes Gavin change his position half way through the afternoon to keep his residual limb from getting irritated. The new position has Gavin leaning back against Victor’s shoulder. To make them both more comfortable, Victor raises his arm and lays it across the back of the couch, letting Gavin settle closer into his side.

The closeness is nice, and surprisingly easy.

When the sun sets in the early evening, Gavin gets up to microwave some leftovers. While he’s gone, his spot on the couch is quickly stolen by a couple of the cats.

“Gavin intends to come back,” Victor informs Pep and Miss.

Miss jumps up onto the back of the couch but Pep stays where she is, sitting directly in the center of the middle cushion.

“I’m used to it!” Gavin calls from the kitchen. His voice lowers but Victor can still hear him through the thin wall. “They own the place, I just live here.”

Paws press onto Victor’s shoulder and then Miss is climbing on top of him from the back of the couch. He sniffs at Victor for a moment and then licks a couple stripes into Victor’s hair over his ear.

Victor reaches up and pulls the cat down onto his lap instead, scratching under his chin. Miss quickly decides this is an acceptable substitute and flops over across Victor’s thighs, beginning to purr.

When Gavin eventually returns, Victor scoops Pep up and clears the spot for him.

“Thanks,” Gavin says as he carefully sits back down before any of the cats can snatch the space again.

Victor sets Pep in between them and she snuggles against Gavin’s thigh.

Their night progresses, this time with all four of the cats periodically moving around them. Even Bowsette vies for Victor’s attention, growing more affectionate the longer they interact with each other after their moment of camaraderie the day before.

It grows late, and Gavin starts to yawn.

“How does your thigh feel?” Victor asks.

Gavin shrugs. “I'm at a three on the scale, maybe? It’s not so bad, anymore. I’ve definitely felt worse than this.”

The evidence of that is written in the scars on Gavin’s body, but pain is pain.

“I’ll get your prescription,” Victor says.

Without argument, Gavin frees himself from the sleeping cats around him and grabs his crutches.

Victor keeps an eye on him as he goes down the hallway, then gets up to do as he said he would. He takes his time turning off the lights and checking the front door of the apartment, giving Gavin the chance to go through his nighttime rituals. By the time Victor arrives at the bedroom, Gavin is wearing his sleep clothes and is sitting on the bed, his crutches up against the nightstand. Victor hands him a painkiller and a glass of water.

Gavin swallows it down and sets the water on the table. “Thanks.”

Lou pads into the bedroom and hops up onto the end of the bed, kneading the comforter under his paws.

“Every night,” Gavin says, grinning.

He slumps into his pillow and then looks up at Victor, sudden shyness flashing across his features. “You can stay, if you want.”

“I’ll stay,” Victor says, like he did earlier. Maybe after a few more times, Gavin will realise that Victor always wants to stay.

He circles around to the other side of the bed, Gavin’s eyes trailing after him like he’s waiting for Victor to change his mind and suddenly divert to the door instead. Victor settles in next to him and adjusts the covers over them both.

“You should lie on your stomach for twenty minutes to straighten out your thigh-”

“Damn, you’re as bad as Ivy,” Gavin grumbles, but he rolls over and bunches up his pillow to lay his head down sideways on top of it. “Did she put you up to this?”

“She may have had some pointers,” Victor says. He shifts onto his side to face Gavin. “We want you to heal well and be prepared for the prosthesis.”

“I know, I know,” Gavin says. There’s a soft smile on his lips, half obscured in his pillow. “It’s fine. It’s not bad.”

Victor simply hums in agreement and the two of them lie together in the quiet, Lou’s purrs the only sound in the room.

It isn’t Victor’s first time spending the night by Gavin’s side, but it feels different to be here like this, in Gavin’s own apartment. After spending half the day together with the cats, Victor can easily put the negotiation and the fight behind him. It already feels more like a home than a crime scene.

Once twenty minutes are up, Victor informs Gavin that he can rearrange himself if he wants, and Gavin surprises him by sliding closer to him, removing the space between them. He has to be careful with his residual limb, but he gets into a position that’s both comfortable and keeps them close to each other, their heads sharing a pillow.

Gavin rests one of his hands against Victor’s chest, right over his thirium pump regulator, like he did in the hospital room.

It takes him awhile to fall asleep. With everything that has happened in the past couple of weeks, a bit of restlessness is expected, but the silence and the closeness still feels natural. Victor listens to the gentle sound of Gavin’s breathing until it finally slows down, signaling that he has managed to drift off.

Victor waits another few minutes and then he closes his eyes to go into stasis.

A little after three o’clock, Victor becomes alert again when Gavin jolts awake, his breath ragged and fingers grasping Victor’s shirt. Without a second thought, Victor wraps an arm around him, gently rubbing his palm along Gavin’s back until he calms. Gavin doesn’t look interested in talking about it and Victor doesn’t pry. Even when Gavin falls back to sleep, Victor continues to hold him through the night, and this time, Gavin remains undisturbed.

* * *

In the morning, Victor wakes up first and carefully extracts himself from the bed without waking Gavin. 

Lou is still there, awake and stretched out at the end of the bed. As Victor passes by, he reaches out to scratch the cat behind the ears, and Lou makes a quiet, content noise in response.

Like he did after Cooper was removed from the scene, Victor goes to feed the cats. Bowsette is under the living room table again, bright eyes watching Victor intently as he passes to the kitchen, where Pep and Miss are already waiting by the cabinet.

Bowsette follows him into the room only a minute later, and then Lou emerges from the bedroom not long after that, the four of them gathering for breakfast. Victor leans back against the kitchen counter to watch them, a small smile on his face.

He’s struck with the feeling that he’d like to make this a routine. He would like to wake up next to Gavin in the mornings and feed the cats before they get ready for work together. While he’s sure he’d have an easier time fitting into Connor and Hank’s home, these days, he doesn’t feel the need to. He doesn’t feel so lost and untethered, not knowing where else to go.

When he hears the sound of Gavin moving from the bedroom to the bathroom, Victor’s eyes land on the coffee machine.

He has never made coffee for Gavin before - has never made coffee for any reason at all - but he does know exactly how Gavin takes it by observation. He figures he could give it a try.

It only takes him half a minute to decide that the machine has entirely too many options. He assumed coffee was just coffee, but apparently it can be done more ways than Victor is prepared for. He has to search for the digital manual on the internet just to understand what everything means, resisting the temptation to just hack it, which might overload it.

He manages to get it pouring by the time Gavin comes into view, still in his sleep clothes but freshened up.

“That for me?” he asks, nodding at the coffee machine.

“No, I’m testing the effect of scalding caffeine on my system.”

Gavin squints at him, hesitantly silent.

“In the spirit of experimentation,” Victor adds.

“I can’t tell if you’re serious,” Gavin grouses. “Fucking poker face.”

Taking mercy on him, Victor drops the act and grins. He grabs the finished coffee and offers it to Gavin.

Shaking his head in bewilderment, Gavin leans himself against the counter so he can accept the mug. “Don’t do that shit so early in the morning, my processor hasn’t booted up yet.”

He takes a tentative sip, then gives an appreciative nod as he lowers the mug back down. “Pretty good for your first cup of coffee.”

“It wasn’t easy,” Victor admits. “For such rudimentary technology, it was surprisingly complex…”

Gavin laughs. “But you prevailed over the coffee machine in the end.”

“I don’t like to leave an objective unfinished.”

“Matter of pride, huh?”

“Perhaps,” Victor says. “Unfortunately, I don’t know the first thing about cooking.”

“What, they didn’t teach that in android detective school?”

“It was an elective, but I decided to take a class on playing poker, instead.”

“Great,” Gavin deadpans, but Victor catches his slight grin before he lifts the mug to take another drink. “C’mon.”

He hands Victor the mug and then straightens up with his crutches, moving out of the kitchen. Victor wraps his hands around the warm ceramic and follows after him, until they end up on the balcony.

Gavin rests one arm on the top of the balcony wall and reaches out with the other, making a grabbing motion to ask for his coffee back.

Morning sun highlights Gavin’s dark hair and makes his eyes shine, the irises prominent as his pupils shrink against so much light. His loose t-shirt shows off his muscular arms and Victor can’t help but watch them flex as Gavin lifts his coffee to his lips.

If his software wasn’t already sufficiently altered, he’s sure the sight of Gavin like this would cause strong modifications to his code. His pump beats hard, sending a warm pulse of thirium through his body.

“What’re you thinking about?” Gavin asks him.

Victor’s face heats up. He doesn’t have the presence of mind to lie, so he aims for being as vague as possible, instead. “Just about how far we’ve come.”

Gavin nods. “Been a wild ride.”

“It has,” Victor agrees.

While Gavin continues to drink his coffee, Victor looks down at the street below Gavin’s apartment, at the humans and androids alike who are going about their mornings, all busy with their own schedules. He sees a human and a child android walking a dog. He sees three humans and two androids all getting onto a bus together. Down on the next block, a human is playing guitar by the intersection and an android stops to listen.

“Do you usually drink your morning coffee out here?” Victor asks.

“Nah, there’s no time to,” Gavin says as he balances his mug on top of the wall. “No reason to rush today, though.”

“I like the view.”

“Yeah? I never thought much of it. Just buildings in every direction.”

“People, as well.”

Gavin sips his coffee and gives the city a considering look. “Guess you’re right.”

The urge to reach over and straighten the tangles of Gavin’s hair just to feel the softness of it becomes almost too strong for Victor to ignore. He suspects that Gavin would allow it; ever since the night in the hospital, they have allowed each other so close. Still, Victor restrains himself, satisfied with the moment as it is.

When Gavin’s coffee is done, he pushes himself off the balcony wall. Victor holds out a hand to take the empty mug from him so they can go back inside.

Bowsette walks up to them and sits down right in Victor’s way, forcing him to stop or walk around her.

Gavin continues past them. “Gonna go get something to eat. Looks like your company is already being stolen for the time being.”

“Call me if you need anything.”

“Mhm.”

As Gavin disappears into the kitchen, Victor sets the empty mug down on the coffee table and then grabs a cat toy that has been left by the cat tree. Bowsette watches him expectantly the whole time, ready to pounce.

By the time Gavin returns, the other cats have joined in. Gavin sits on the couch to watch them all, a relaxed and fond expression on his face. Eventually, the cats tire and spread out across the living room to nap.

“I thought we could do some stretches this morning,” Victor says.

Gavin rubs his palm over his left thigh. “I know I have to do them, but I can handle it on my own if you’d rather do something else.”

Some of the stretches in Ivy’s plan include things that benefit from an extra pair of hands to help with staying steady. Victor is more than happy to help. “If you’re comfortable with it, I’ll go through the routine with you.”

After only a second, Gavin nods and stands up. “Yeah, I don’t mind. Let’s get this over with, then. Can you get a towel from the closet?”

While Gavin carefully lowers himself to the living room floor, Victor steps into the hall and searches through the closet. He returns with a small towel and kneels down in front of Gavin, rolling it up into a short cylinder shape and setting it aside until they need it.

“Good to go?” Victor asks.

Gavin drops down onto his back. “Yep.”

Victor places his hand under Gavin’s right leg and directs it up into the air, pushing gently until Gavin flashes him a thumbs up. He sets a timer for twenty seconds. When the time is up, he directs Gavin’s leg back down, lets him relax for a moment, and then does the same with his residual limb.

Towards the end of the twenty seconds, Victor feels the muscle of Gavin’s thigh jump under his palm, but Gavin doesn’t mention it.

“Pain scale?” Victor asks.

“Two.”

“Are you downplaying it?”

Gavin rolls his eyes. “No.”

He lifts his right leg again without waiting for Victor.

“You’ll tell me if the number changes?” Victor prompts.

“Yeah,” Gavin says. “I’m good, promise.”

He does look sincere, at least. His features remain relaxed, only becoming briefly strained towards the end of each subsequent stretch of his left thigh, so Victor takes his word for it.

After they’ve finished the first exercise, Victor grabs the rolled-up towel and slides it in underneath Gavin’s residual limb.

“Ugh, I hate this one,” Gavin grumbles, but he lifts his hips up off the ground, transferring his weight and holding the position.

Victor lays a gentle hand on top of Gavin’s thigh to keep it steady. He notes that it’s looking good for this stage of the recovery; the swelling is down and his skin hasn’t become irritated. At this rate, his prosthesis fitting will go perfectly, especially since it's Elijah crafting the leg.

At twenty seconds, Victor puts his other hand on Gavin’s hip, directing him back down.

“You’re doing well,” he says.

“I’ll be back to visiting the gym in no time, I bet.”

Gavin lifts his hips again for round two. By the end of it, he’s gritting his teeth, so Victor pulls the towel away and lets him take a break.

While Gavin rests, Lou makes his way over to them and lays down next to Gavin’s head, poking his nose against Gavin’s cheek.

“Hey, buddy,” Gavin says as he turns his face and lets the cat nuzzle him.

The image causes a phantom stutter in Victor’s system, flustering him into unresponsiveness for a moment. Fortunately, Gavin is too preoccupied to notice and Victor has the time to recollect himself.

“Now you have  _two_ spotters,” he jokes.

Gavin grins. “I better get back to work, then.”

He sits up, but shifts backwards so Lou is level with his hip and he can give the cat a scratch behind the ears before continuing on with the exercise.

At the end of the routine, Gavin admits to a minor spike in his pain, but a sense of accomplishment keeps his spirits high. They take the afternoon easy, and Victor grows ever more sure that everything will work out just fine.

* * *

Waking up before Gavin becomes a habit. Victor doesn’t need such frequent stasis and can only stay in bed for so long before he grows restless, so he finds quiet things to do in the mornings while he waits. Often, he plays with the cats, except for Lou who rarely emerges from the bedroom until Gavin does.

One morning, he gets a message from Connor. He sits in the living room with Pep on his lap and closes his eyes to focus on touching base with his brother. Connor tells him that Hank is out of his arm sling and cases at the DPD have calmed down.

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: We located your witness, the MC500 from the hospital. Everything but the court date will be taken care of before you and Gavin even get back to work._

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: Gavin and I both appreciate it.**

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: How are things going with you two?_

**RK900 # 313 248 317 – 88: I like being here, spending time with him. I never could have predicted how close we would become.**

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: Some of the best outcomes are that way, I’ve found. Human and deviant unpredictability can result in something unexpected and wonderful._

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: I’m happy for you._

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: Thank you. I’m happy, too.**

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: Is Sixty doing okay?**

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: He’s adjusting as best he can. Being unable to speak still grates on him, but relying on messaging and interfacing agitates him as well. However, he and Hank are getting along very well despite the language barrier._

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: Oh?**

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: They manage to communicate even without words on Sixty’s part. When the two of them walk Sumo together, Sixty returns in a better mood than when they left._

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: In any case, Elijah will have everything ready for the three of you in a couple of days. I’ll let you know when we’re all meeting._

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: Thank you. Tell him my regulator can wait, if he can get Sixty’s modulator done sooner. I’m operating fine.**

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: Think again, Victor. We don’t want you to be at risk. It’s only a couple of days._

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: If you insist.**

Tiny, pointed, and sharp teeth dig into Victor’s finger, gnawing at the plating and causing his skin to flicker. Victor opens his eyes and looks down, finding that Pep has awoken from her catnap and decided it’s time to play. He waggles his fingers and Pep attacks them with renewed vigor, determined to win the perceived fight.

From the kitchen, he can hear the sounds of Gavin rinsing dishes in the sink. Victor hadn't noticed him waking up.

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: Gavin’s awake. Talk to you soon.**

_RK800 #313 248 317 – 52: In a couple of days._

Only a minute later, Gavin emerges from the adjacent room and comes to sit down with them. “Leave the poor man alone, Pep,” he says. “Mornin’.”

“Good morning.”

Pep bats her paw at Victor's wrist and clamps her whole mouth down on his finger.

“Pep, come on,” Gavin warns.

“It’s okay,” Victor says, grinning. “We’re just playing. She won’t be able to damage anything.”

“You spoil them. They’re going to think it’s okay to bite  _me_ that much.”

“I’ll just have to make sure they expend most of their energy with me, first, then,” Victor says.

On cue, Pep pounces at Gavin. He swoops her up into the air and plants a bunch of kisses to her face while she purrs up a storm. When he lowers her back down on the couch cushion between himself and Victor, she appears content to curl up and rest again.

“If I’d known you would be such a cat person, I would have brought you here to meet them a lot sooner,” Gavin teases.

“I didn’t know, either.” The android he was upon activation probably wouldn’t have thought twice about pets. “But we got here eventually.”

“Sure did. And you fit right in.” Gavin’s voice is full of fondness that threatens to make Victor overheat, but then his expression turns serious, and when he speaks again, his tone has dropped in timbre. “Actually, there’s someone else I’d like you to meet.

“It’s the anniversary of my mom’s death. Not gonna let crutches get in the way of visiting the cemetery. You up to join me?”

His phrasing makes it clear that he isn’t asking Victor to help him because of his injury, he’s inviting Victor along for a much deeper reason. After swallowing around a phantom thickness in his throat, Victor nods. “Of course. I’d… be honoured.”

Gavin’s face softens into a smile. He grabs his crutches without further ado. “Cool. Give me a minute to get dressed, then we'll go.”

* * *

The cemetery grounds are covered in a couple inches of uneven snow, forcing them to move slowly and carefully through the rows of stones. The frosty air turns Gavin’s cheeks pink as he leads Victor to his mother’s plot, finally coming to a stop and adjusting his weight on his crutches.

The gravestone is small and simple, embedded into the ground instead of standing tall like most of the others around it. It’s engraved with the same information that came up when Victor searched his databases for her during their stakeout, no other descriptors or iconography. At age sixteen and newly orphaned, Gavin wouldn’t have had many options for his mother’s burial.

Gavin takes a deep breath as he gazes down on the weathered stone, but he doesn’t say anything. Neither of them speaks, and that’s okay. Gavin will tell Victor more about Marisela Reed when he’s ready, as he did in the car a couple of weeks ago.

After a few quiet moments, the tension eases out of Gavin’s body and he leans against Victor’s side. “Thanks for coming with me.”

“Thank you for inviting me.”

They stay for a little while longer, until Gavin pulls away and turns to go, Victor keeping pace by his side.

* * *

On the day that they’ve arranged to meet at Elijah’s for repairs and a prosthesis fitting, Gavin moves at a more languid pace than usual, lingering through every morning task as they draw nearer to leaving the apartment. As tired as Gavin has grown of needing crutches, both of them welcomed a break to recover.

But they’re ready to get back into their usual routine, and their family is waiting for them.

Hank’s car is already parked outside of Elijah’s when they arrive. Victor hasn’t seen him, Connor, or Sixty since all of them last congregated here, and Victor is eager to see them again. He and Connor haven’t been apart so long since Victor’s first time waking up in A3.

The door is answered not by Chloe, but by Ivy. She wraps one arm around Gavin’s shoulders to give him a quick hug and then quizzes him on how he’s been healing while she takes them downstairs to the workshop.

Inside, Sixty is sitting on a table with his throat panel open and Elijah is reconnecting a new voice modulator. Hank is standing next to them, a comforting hand on Sixty’s shoulder.

Connor is already on his way to Victor. Without preamble, the two of them wrap their arms around each other in greeting. Over Connor’s shoulder, Victor sees Sixty watching them and lifts a hand off Connor’s back to wave at him. The corner of Sixty’s lips twitches into an almost-smile and he waves back.

“Would you stay still?” Elijah mutters, as he connects another wire.

Sixty rolls his eyes and lifts a single finger in Victor and Connor’s direction as if to say  _just one minute, and then I want a hug, too_.

Victor gives Sixty a thumbs up as he, Connor, Gavin, and Ivy join him and the others, waiting for Elijah to put the finishing touches on Sixty’s repair.

When it’s done, Elijah steps back. “Give it a go.”

Sixty’s LED goes yellow when he hums experimentally, and then it quickly returns to blue. He smirks before opening his mouth and letting out a long stream of vulgar language, looking positively gleeful the entire time.

At everyone’s shock, Sixty laughs, the sound loud and joyous. “I’m back in working order, motherfuckers, what’s good?!”

Hank snorts and Gavin mutters, “Jesus,” under his breath.

“I’ll take that to mean everything is connected properly,” Elijah says with exasperation, swiping his hand across a tablet screen of readings. “That’s as good a test as any, unless you want to double check languages and singing.”

Sixty starts singing  _Ring a Ring o’ Roses_  in Welsh. Hearing something so unexpected turns Hank’s expression from amused to startled.

“Okay, okay,” Elijah says. He waves a hand at Sixty as a gesture for him to move and then points at Victor. “You’re up.”

Before they trade places, Victor finally gets the chance to pull Sixty into a hug. His brother melts against him and grips him close, in no rush to separate. Once Sixty is satisfied, he lightly pats Victor on the chest by his thirium pump regulator and nudges him towards the table.

“Time for heart surgery.” While Victor is getting seated, Sixty turns to Elijah. “If anything goes wrong, I’ll-”

Elijah cuts the threat off, looking unamused. “Nothing will go wrong.”

Gavin lifts himself up onto the worktable beside Victor, now looking apprehensive as well. “This is safe, right?”

“Could you all have a little faith?”

Elijah picks up a small, metal case from his desk, opens it up, and removes a thirium pump regulator from inside of it. The front-facing end looks exactly the same, but the internals appear far more complicated than the standard RK900 regulator that Victor had upon official activation.

“Did some upgrades,” Elijah says. “Improved thirium efficiency, first of all, like having better circulation. I’ve also reinforced the connectors. The unit still needs to be removable in the case of emergencies, repairs, or replacement, but it won’t be easy for someone to simply rip it out of you. Next, there are additional wire hookups that will give you more time to get it back in before shutdown. A3 has more than enough space to back you up, if absolutely necessary, but if you want to avoid potential loss of data, it would be much better to just get the regulator back in before the timer runs out, wouldn’t it?”

Still processing through his surprise, Victor only nods. He assumed Elijah would just remake the component, not update it so thoroughly – and in ways that will prevent a similar deactivation in the future. “Yes, that would be preferable,” he says finally. “Thank you.”

Elijah’s eyes flicker over to Gavin before he responds. “Since you have such a tendency to get yourselves in trouble, I’d say caution is warranted. Shall we?”

Victor unbuttons his shirt and moves it out of the way. Preferring to retain some control over the procedure, he presses his fingers down over his old regulator himself, then looks up at Elijah for confirmation that he’s ready.

“Go ahead.”

Ignoring a mild spike in his anxiety, Victor twists the component until it releases and slides out.

The countdown begins, but Elijah is already stepping forward and holding the new one up to the gap. He reaches into Victor’s chassis to quickly align the ports and connectors with practiced and steady fingers and there’s plenty of time to spare when the new regulator is slotted inside. Victor’s system begins a series of tests and checks as his thirium circulation restarts. He thinks he can actually feel the difference; his thirium pump returns to optimal condition within seconds and there’s a heightened energy coming from his steady pulse.

“Is it okay?” Gavin asks.

“Yes,” Victor answers. The primary system check completes with no issues found. “All clear.”

“Good,” Elijah says. “Let me know if something acts up.”

Victor stands up from the table and buttons his shirt as his skin fills out over the component again, hiding it almost completely from view. The ridge of it is subtler than it used to be, perhaps not as easy to find for someone who isn’t familiar enough with androids to know exactly where the component sits.

“Your turn,” Elijah tells Gavin.

He turns to a workbench and pulls out a long drawer. A leg lies inside of it, made of white and grey synthetic material just like an android’s. The only difference is that the very top of it is hollowed out to fit around Gavin’s residual limb, instead of ending in a mechanical joint at the hip.

Elijah picks it up and sets it back down next to Gavin. “Get in there.”

“Do you have to say it like that? Christ,” Gavin grumbles as he unbuckles his belt.

Under his jeans are his gym shorts, which allow him to easily maneuver his thigh into the prosthesis. The mechanical leg covers six inches of his residual limb before the top edges of it rest level with his skin, almost as seamless as the edge of Victor’s regulator.

“Describe how it feels,” Elijah says.

“Uh… comfortably fit, I guess? Maybe a little loose at the bottom.”

Elijah draws his finger along the outside of Gavin’s synthetic thigh, just above the knee, which causes a portion of it to light up.

Gavin blinks in surprise. “Whoa. What did you do?”

“I’ve given you the ability to adjust your leg whenever you need to, as long as you have enough thirium on reserve. You won't be forced to drop everything and get a refitting. Put your fingers here.”

Gavin does as asked and moves his fingertip along a lit-up bar on his thigh. Instantly, he jolts and pulls his hand away. “Did it just…?”

“Fill in the space, yes,” Elijah says.

“Felt weird.”

“You’ll get used to it. It’s like android skin; it can build up and break down on command.”

“That’s… pretty cool,” Gavin admits.

Putting his fingers back onto his thigh, he brings down the same setting as before, just a touch.

“Does it fit well, now?” Elijah asks.

Gavin nods. “Fuck yeah, it does.”

“Let’s do some movement and sensation configurations, then.”

Victor smiles to himself as he watches Gavin become bolstered and excited to have his old range of motion back. If all goes well, he’ll be walking on his own two feet within the hour.

As Elijah directs Gavin through calibrations and tests, the group disperses some. Sixty and Hank go upstairs, Connor and Ivy stay, and Victor’s mind starts to wander. He closes his eyes and finds his uplink to A3, the virtual space filling out around him in his mind’s eye.

Amanda greets him with a closed-lip smile, the kind of subtle smile that has always been her custom. The difference is in her eyes — they’re warm, friendly.

“I’m glad to see you doing well, Victor,” she says.

“And I you,” he says. “I’m sorry, I should have visited sooner.”

She waves her hand loosely, unbothered. “You deserved some time to yourself. Both you and Detective Reed. In the meantime, I’ve had plenty of company from Elijah and the trio.”

Victor understands; she must cherish the time she’s had to reconnect with her family as much as Victor has cherished his time to expand his own. In a sense, Amanda and Gavin are links between two halves of a whole, which reminds Victor of something he has been considering, lately.

“May I ask you something, Amanda?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Do you identify with the last name ‘Stern’?”

Amanda’s eyes drift away from him, going unfocused in thought before she responds. “Amanda Stern and I aren’t exactly the same. We never could be, with the differences in our experiences. Not unlike Connor and Sixty.

“That said… yes, I suppose I do. I may not have filled her place in the world, but I filled a space left by her in Elijah’s world. I would only be concerned about taking more from her than I have the right to.”

In their shared moment of deviation, Victor saw Amanda’s activation, when she responded positively to the name Elijah gave her and how curious she was about the woman she emulates. He saw a time when Amanda — having had her memories taken — mistook herself for Amanda Stern. Victor thinks they might be more alike than Amanda gives herself credit for.

“I think Elijah wanted to see her spirit live on in you,” he says.

“You’re right, that was certainly his goal.” She meets Victor’s gaze once again. “I would be grateful to have her last name, and would strive to honour her memory.”

While Victor feels perfectly welcomed by Hank as family ─ while Connor has taken Hank’s last name and Sixty appears likely to follow suit ─ part of Victor still feels pulled in a second direction. “As would I.”

Cocking her head, she considers his words. “Not Anderson?”

Victor knows he doesn’t need to take the Anderson name to be a part of the Anderson family. In the end, what brought them together goes far beyond names. “You are as much my family as Hank is,” he says. “And Victor Stern has a nice ring to it.”

Amanda smiles her usual, gentle smile, and there is mirth in her eyes. “Yes, it does. Victor Stern it is, then.”

Stepping forward, she raises her arms and pulls him into a hug, drawing him down so she can kiss his cheek. They hold each other close, just the two of them in the otherwise empty virtual space.

“You should head back,” Amanda says in time, her voice soft next to his ear. “Be with the others.”

With a nod, Victor pulls away from her. “I’ll see you soon.”

Then she’s gone, and Victor opens his eyes back in Elijah’s workshop.

Gavin is on his feet, one hand pressed to the worktable for support as he walks the length of it in cautious steps. The leg is no longer white and grey, but an exact match for Gavin’s skin tone. When he reaches the corner of the table, he stops and releases a slow, heavy breath.

“I’m walking,” he says, like he can hardly believe it.

“Of course you are,” Elijah says. “What did I just say about having faith? You could not be in better hands than mine.”

“Not all of us have the self-assurance of gods, Eli.”

“It just so happens that I take that as a compliment.”

“You suck, you know that?”

“That’s  _your_ misinformed opinion.”

Ivy is watching them with a proud expression and even Connor has half a smile on his face.

Elijah turns to Victor. “Help him walk around the house a bit and get used to the leg, would you?”

Victor steps forward and offers Gavin his arm. Without hesitation, Gavin switches from holding the worktable to curling a hand into the crook of Victor’s elbow.

“Stairs are going to be weird,” Gavin says.

“Better than going down them with the crutches,” Victor says. “We’ll take it slow.”

Elijah dismisses them with a little wave. “Have fun.”

Carefully, Victor directs Gavin away from the worktable and they walk out of the room side by side. Gavin’s footsteps become progressively steadier, and by the time they reach the staircase, he’s walking with confidence. They take the first few stairs one at a time until Gavin gets used to the feeling, after which it seems to come as naturally to him as it does for an android to use their manufactured legs.

At the end of the hallway, they turn into the living room and then continue to the pool room. Gavin leans against Victor’s side, not out of need for support, as far as Victor can tell, but out of the desire to be closer.

Both the red pool water and the iced-over lake beyond Elijah’s property glitter with morning sunlight. Gavin stops and faces the floor-to-ceiling windows, eyes finding Detroit’s skyline in the distance and taking in the view.

Victor only has eyes for Gavin. Just like the mornings they spent on the balcony, he’s captured by the accentuated details of Gavin’s relaxed and happy face.

Gavin must be able to sense Victor watching him because he looks up. “What’s that face for?”

“What face?”

Continuing to turn until they’re facing each other entirely, Gavin lifts his hand from Victor’s elbow to grasp his shoulder.

“It’s a face like you want to say something but you’re stopping yourself. You don’t have to do that. Hold back, I mean.”

And Victor doesn’t want to. It used to be that his system held him back, but it no longer has that power over him.

His gaze drops briefly to Gavin’s lips. When he locks eyes with Gavin again, there’s anticipation and eagerness in his expression.

Gavin raises his other hand to wrap around the back of Victor’s neck, and Victor isn’t sure which of them moves first - if he begins to lean down and Gavin follows, or if he simply goes willingly when Gavin reels him in.

The press of Gavin’s warm, chapped lips against his own causes a pleasant feeling on his biosensors. Over the past week, Victor has catalogued a magnitude of new sensory inputs: the softness of a cat’s nose or toe pads, the sunshine strong in his optic lenses from the elevation of Gavin’s apartment balcony, the comfortable weight of Gavin’s body against his. This one might be his favourite.

Sliding his hand higher, Gavin threads his fingers into Victor’s hair and deepens the kiss. Ever since the moment in Elijah’s guest bedroom, Victor has wanted this, and it sends a heady thrill through his chassis to know that Gavin feels the same.

Victor gives in to the desire to feel more of Gavin’s skin, slipping his hand under the back of Gavin’s shirt to lay his palm across the small of his back. In response, Gavin makes an approving sound against his lips and arches closer, slotting his knee in between Victor’s legs and bringing them flush against each other.

Footing unsteady, Gavin wavers, and both of them remember that he’s still getting used to his left leg again. Victor wraps his arms further around Gavin’s waist to keep him from stumbling and he can feel Gavin’s lips curl into a smile at the last moment before he pulls away.

“Alright?” Victor asks softly as Gavin regains his bearings.

“Yeah, definitely alright. Just… forgot everything else, for a second.”

“We were supposed to be taking it slow, weren’t we?”

“I’ve never been good at impulse control,” Gavin says with a shrug.

“I suppose it’s up to me to be the sensible one,” Victor teases.

Gavin scoffs. “Who needs sensible?”

Grinning, Victor lightly bumps their noses together before capturing Gavin’s lips in another kiss, quick and chaste, and then pulls back. He keeps a hand on Gavin’s hip, stabilizing him and maintaining the connection between them.

Footsteps behind Victor draw both their attention to Tina and Karoline entering from the hallway. They’re both wearing loose, comfortable clothing and Tina’s hair is down in a wild tangle like she just got out of bed. Karoline’s arm is laid across her shoulders.

“ _Nice_ ,” Gavin says, raising his palm for Tina as they approach.

Karoline smirks; Tina chuckles and gives him a high five, then makes a fist for Gavin to bump his own into. “Judging from the eye-fucking we just witnessed, I could say the same to you.”

Gavin glances up at Victor, grin turning soft. “Yeah.”

“Oh God, you two are going to be insufferable at work,” Tina says, not unkindly. “Congrats. Now c’mon, let’s get breakfast.”

She and Karoline lead the way to the other end of the room and into the kitchen. Gavin and Victor follow behind them, linking arms again.

Chloe, Sixty, and Hank are already present, the three of them sitting together around the large island. There’s something baking in the oven and Sixty is in the middle of what seems like a long-winded story about his pet rat.

As they all enter the room, Chloe quickly slides off her stool to approach Gavin, throwing her arms around his shoulders.

“Hey. Wondered where you were,” Gavin says, hugging her close.

He remains steady on his feet, so Victor steps away from them, letting them have their reunion.

“I didn’t want you to feel overwhelmed,” Chloe says. “I knew Ivy would fuss, so I waited my turn.”

Gavin huffs a laugh. “You were right about that.”

“It’s good to see you.”

“You too, Chlo.”

They part, and then Chloe leads Gavin to an empty stool, pulling it out for him. While she sits with him on one side, Victor joins them on the other.

After Sixty’s story finishes, Hank turns his attention to Gavin. “All good?”

“Yeah, so far,” Gavin answers. “Haven’t fallen on my face, yet, so we’ll call it a win.”

Reappearing from downstairs at last, Connor, Ivy, and Elijah join the group, finding what little available space they can amongst the rest of them. It’s crowded, and the chatter becomes a little hectic, but Victor doesn’t mind one bit. He reaches across the short distance between him and Gavin and threads their fingers together. Gavin squeezes his hand back, sending a warm pulse through Victor’s chassis.

With his other hand, Gavin fishes his phone out of his sweater pocket and Victor watches him tap away at it for a minute before a message pings in his system, private and separate from the conversation around them.

_Detective Gavin Reed: so… can i take you out for a drink sometime? heard about a place that was getting thirium on tap, recently_

Victor tries not to smile too broadly and draw anyone’s attention to them.

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: You did imply that there would be a ‘next time’ when we were last there.**

_Detective Gavin Reed: sure did. this time with less police work and attempted bar fights, promise. how about it?_

Even with the almost-fight, their first time to Tali’s bar hadn’t been so bad, either. It was Victor’s first day back at the precinct, it was the beginning of his and Gavin’s partnership in earnest, it was the day they started becoming friends. Victor is more than happy to return there for a drink. He rubs his thumb along Gavin’s as he sends his reply.

**RK900 #313 248 317 – 88: I'd love to. It’s a date.**

**Author's Note:**

> mentions of the Equal Rights for Androids Act are references to [Fantismal's New ERA series](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1072740), and the discord server with the same name. if you want to chat with other dbh fans, see lots of great fanfic and fanart, and get updates/snippets/etc for this fic (amongst many others), come join us: https://discord.gg/5MRvpHr


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